IU looks for morale-boosting win

The Hoosiers return home today following a road loss to Michigan Nov. 2, hoping to transform solid performance into a victory. Head coach Kris Kirchner said that, despite the 160-82.5 loss to Michigan, the team is swimming well. \n"I wasn't very disappointed in our Michigan performance," Kirchner said. "Our team swam well, except in one area -- our sprinter core group. Our speed guys were not right, they were a little off. That comes from training and being tired from over-training. \n"So, I'm looking for a little more performance out of them overall. But, in general, I'm expecting everybody to swim well, their best to this point."\nAgainst Michigan, junior David Schulze won the 200-yard individual medley, sophomore Murph Halasz won the 200-yard butterfly and freshman Richard Bryant placed third and fourth in the 500- and 1650-yard freestyle events, respectively. \nKirchner said he will look for repeat performances from all three, as well as the rest of the team. \n"This is the first three-day competition, it's a mirror of the Big Ten meet," Kirchner said. "We're looking forward to a lot of swimming, which is important in our endeavors towards the end of the year at the Big Tens. We have a lot of events to swim in three days, and everybody will be swimming their best event. So, I'm looking for some fast times and possible NCAA qualifying times."\nBryant said a win would boost team morale.\n"It's very important (for us to win)," Bryant said. "We were disappointed on the way back from Michigan, we all had our heads down it seems, so this is a meet where we can get back up. And, at the moment, I haven't seen any weak points. We have swimmers in every event that can really perform. I can't see any weak points at the moment."\nJoining IU at the event are the University of Cincinnati Bearcats, the Evansville Purple Aces, the Texas A & M Aggies and Kentucky's diving squad. IU beat Evansville 189-103 in their first meet of the year Oct. 20.\nKirchnir said the toughest competition will come from the south.\n"Texas A & M is probably the best team at the competition overall, and they will put forth a good effort, I'm sure," Kirchner said. "They're deep in every event, so it'll be a great meet."\nOn the diving side, head coach Jeff Huber said the team is ahead of the pace they set last year, in a season where the Hoosiers won their seventh and eighth consecutive national titles. \n"It's still early to do a lot of evaluation, but I think in general, we look a lot better," Huber said. "I mean, based on what we looked like this time last year, we're way ahead."\nHuber will use the Indiana Invitational to test out some of the more difficult dives, despite the fact it could mean a drop-off in points.\n"We're going to use this to increase our degree of difficulty, our harder dives, by quite a bit -- almost all the way down the line, with everybody on the team," Huber said. "We're probably not going to be as ready as we will be for Big Tens, but it should be interesting. They'll be some very good divers here and I think we'll have some good performances. \n"We'll have some people trying some very difficult dives, and we may see some not-so-good scores, but that's OK."\nSophomore Marc Carlton, whose career-best second place finishes off the one-meter and three-meter boards against Michigan earned him co-Big Ten diver of the week, said he looks forward to trying some of the harder dives.\n"This is going to be the first time we're throwing our 10 meter lift and that's actually been going the best it's ever been," Carlton said. "I'm throwing a reverse three-and-a-half dive, which is a very hard dive that I've never thrown before, so I think I should do really well up there. I want to nail some dives."\nThe Indiana Invitational continues through Sunday. The Hoosiers next compete at the U.S. Open Swimming meet Nov. 29 through Dec. 1.