Sports
Ohio Swimming Continues Without Divers
By: Abbey Carnivale
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The Ohio swimming and diving team will continue their midseason stretch on Feb. 7, as they travel to Cincinnati for a dual met against the Xavier Musketeers at 5 p.m.
The Musketeers plan to bounce back after a close loss to Wright State, and Ohio swimming will have to combat the hungry Navy Blue and White squad without their counterpart, the diving team.
Having the diving team at meets often provides a necessary break for the swimmers as the three-meter dives and one-meter dives split the meet into three sections.
Instead of around 20-25 minutes of break, the swimmers now only have 15 minutes to regroup, recharge and refocus. This puts Ohio at a slight disadvantage, as not only are they used to longer breaks, but Xavier is used to much shorter breaks.
“As far as game-planning for not having the divers, we just have to make sure we take advantage of every opportunity that we have on the swimming side, trying to counteract those diving points that we’re so used to having,” interim head coach Derick Roe said.
Another setback for the Bobcats is the weather that has plagued Ohio’s campus, canceling all activities. This means that the swimming and diving team had to go without practices on Monday, and doubled up their in-pool practices on Tuesday and Wednesday.
“We’re gonna do two swims today, which we will typically only do one,” Roe said. “We’ll also do two tomorrow [Wednesday]. That’s very atypical of us too, to go back-to-back days with two swims.”
After a two-meet weekend, the swimmers are almost at their exhaustion point with the rigorous practice schedules, while entering their second consecutive two-meet weekend.
“It’s just finding the balance, tomorrow [Wednesday] will be light,” Roe said. “We’ll spend an hour of that doing yoga just to not overload them too much within those two days, when were only a day removed from our first meet of the weekend.”
At their last showing, the green and white competed against Iowa State and West Virginia, ending in the middle of the two. Their past several meets have ended in the final races, with opponents typically taking or extending their lead.
If the Bobcats can endure just a few more days of practice and competition, they will be able to record competitive times that will allow them to recover with confidence before the Mid-American Conference Championships at the end of the month.