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Water polo
No. 18 Hoosiers get break from top competition

The IU water polo team will travel to Santa Cruz, Calif., this weekend and for the first time this season will not have to play a nationally ranked team.

The Hoosiers will play UC Santa Cruz, Cal State Monterey Bay and Pacific on Saturday and will finish the UC Santa Cruz Slugfest by playing Santa Clara on Sunday morning.

IU coach Barry King said all four weekend games are winnable. It will help playing teams that aren’t on the same level as their past opponents, he added.

“The speed of the game might slow down a little bit, and that is kind of our responsibility to push the action and hopefully speed it up some,” King said. “That will be to our advantage if the action is going fast against the teams we’re going to see.”

Since the team is not playing the top teams in the country, sophomore Kelsey Campbell said this weekend’s games are a chance for the team to get on the right track.

“I think it will be a really good chance for us to get a couple wins under our belt,” Campbell said. “As good as the games have been so far, it will be really nice to boost our confidence a bit more.”
– Andrew Wyder

Track and Field
Big Tens await men and women

Championship time is here this weekend.

After competing in a series of unscored meets to open the season, the Hoosiers will now try to score the most points and win the Big Ten Championship.

The women will be host to the championship at Gladstein Fieldhouse while the men head to Penn State.

To score points, a team or player must place in the top eight in an event. In each contest, first place wins 10 points while second through eighth places score eight, six, five, four, three, two and one points, respectively.

Penn State and Minnesota are the favorites to win this weekend’s event.

IU will be favored to win only in men’s pole vault, but IU coach Ron Helmer said victories and seeds don’t mean much – finishing high up in events is more important.

“No matter where we are seeded, I think we have a chance to win events,” Helmer said. “However, if we came out with second place in six or eight events then it will be a good team showing.”    

Freshman Olu Olamigoke said he hopes treating this weekend like a normal meet will get him the results he wants.

“I am going to take it like any other meet I have been to,” Olamigoke said. “I am not going to press too hard, and performances will come with that.”
– Ari Shifron

Men’s Tennis
IU stays home for regional foes

The No. 59 Hoosiers are preparing to wrestle the dogs this weekend, playing the Southern Illinois Salukis and the Butler Bulldogs on Saturday.

Coming off a 4-3 loss to No. 19 Alabama, the Hoosiers will challenge unranked regional rivals. Playing the second and third matches of their five-match home stand, IU hopes the home-court advantage can propel them against their non-conference opponents.

“I like playing on the courts we use to practice,” freshman Maxime Armengaud said. “You don’t have to take your car to the hotel and come back and then go to a restaurant.”

Matching up against the Salukis since 1956, the Hoosiers have won the previous five meetings and hold a 15-12 all-time record. The match is the first meeting between the teams in ten years.

“When you’re going to play this kind of team, this kind of match, you really have to win," Armengaud said. “It’s a question of pride. I think that’s really important to IU.”

IU has been playing against Butler since 1936 with an 11-1 all-time record against the Bulldogs, and was victorious in the past seven meetings. With six freshmen on a ten-man roster, the young Hoosier team is gaining experience with each match.

“Lots of times, we have to learn very fast,” Armengaud said. “Freshmen are not freshmen. We have to win the match.”
– Stephanie Kuzydym

Men’s Tennis
Hoosiers hope for rebound

Caught in a three-match drought, the No. 44 IU women’s tennis team is in search of a win against No. 23 Wake Forest. IU had two rough road matchups last weekend, winning one match in the 18 played.

The Hoosiers hope the home court advantage will let them rebound.

With Wake Forest traveling from North Carolina, freshman Megan Matter said being home gives the Hoosiers a bit of an edge.

“It’s always nice to play at your home courts,” Matter said. “Traveling always has wear and tear on you. You get a little tired. It’s just kind of exhausting.”

Wake Forest enters Bloomington with two singles players ranked in the top 100, No. 49 Sasha Kulikova and No. 89 Sierra Poske. The two nationally ranked singles players combine to make the No. 45 doubles team.

Going 0-3 against top-ranked players last weekend, players said changes need to be made.

“A lot of it is belief in ourselves and working together as a team,” Matter said. “We’ve had some meetings and kind of talked about it. There are things we can do better and bring more energy to practice and warm-ups, and our focus can always get better, too.”
– By Stephanie Kuzydym

Women’s swimming and diving
Hoosier’s Last Chance Saturday

One week after winning the Big Ten Championship, the IU women’s swimming and diving team hits the pool again in a final attempt for swimmers to qualify for the NCAA Championships in March.

Saturday’s Last Chance Meet, held at IU’s Counsilman Billingsley Aquatic Center, is an NCAA-approved meet where four teams participate for individual and relay times to be counted toward qualification for the NCAA Championships, assistant coach Pam Swander said.

“It’s basically just swim as fast as you can at this time, and to get the best times that you haven’t been getting during the season,” freshman distance swimmer Laura Head said.

No swimmers participating Saturday took part in last week’s Big Tens. The last time any Last Chance Meet participant competed was Jan. 24 at Purdue. The team can bring 18 contestants to NCAAs.

“Of course we would like to get a full roster,” Swander said. “I think the girls have worked hard, and they should expect to have lifetime best times in their best events.”

Swimmers who are unable to make the NCAA cut will join the team at the sectional meet in Indianapolis the last weekend in March.
– By Kevin Loughery

Baseball
IU heads to Austin Paey Invitational

The IU baseball team will participate in its second southern tournament when it heads to Clarksville, Tenn., to take part in the Austin Peay Invitational this weekend.
The Hoosiers (2-1) will face Ball State, Austin Peay State and Cleveland State on Feb. 27, 28 and March 1, respectively.

A canceled IU-Purdue University Fort Wayne game will have IU heading into Clarksville after a five-day layoff.

IU began the season in Florida at the BIG EAST/Big Ten Challenge, where it suffered an early loss against West Virginia but rebounded against Georgetown and USF.

IU junior pitcher Matt Bashore (0-1) will look to get back on track against Ball State after a three-inning performance where he gave up eight hits and collected a loss.

Bashore, a fixture on preseason lists for the nation’s best college pitcher, will be followed by junior Eric Arnett (1-0) and freshman Blake Monar (1-0). They will pitch against Austin Peay State and Cleveland State, respectively.

The Hoosier bats were hot in the BIG EAST/Big Ten challenge and will attempt to stay on point in Clarksville. One of the more notable performances came from IU junior catcher Josh Phegley, who hit .545 in his first three games.  
– DeAntae Prince

Softball
Team remains optimistic despite 1-10 record

Usually on a 1-10 team, there is a lot of finger-pointing, and the pressure starts to build up.

The scenario is the complete opposite for the 1-10 IU softball team, which heads into the DeMarini Invitational at Cal State Fullerton with the same mentality that IU head coach Michelle Gardner has instilled since day one: optimism.

“(Gardner) has really helped us focus on things we need to do to be successful,” junior and outfielder Jennifer Glueckert said. “It’s like a full turnaround from last year’s coaching staff.”

The lead off-hitting outfielder has stepped up for the Hoosiers, hitting two triples in an 8-3 loss to East Carolina last weekend. Glueckert has more than doubled her slugging percentage from .226 last season to .481 this season and has already exceeded her extra-base hit total, 2, from last season.

“I feel more comfortable this year,” Glueckert said. “I worked on getting more power and improving my footwork all offseason.”

Glueckert, as well as the rest of the Hoosiers, will need to continue her ways as the No. 7 Stanford Cardinal welcomes IU to Cal State Fullerton on Friday afternoon.

Stanford is the fourth top 10 opponent the Hoosiers will have faced in the last four many weekends.
 – Connor O’Gara