Princeton University Athletics
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Women's Swim/Dive Heads North With Hopes Of Reclaiming Ivy Crown
February 24, 2010 | Women's Swimming and Diving
WEEKEND SCHEDULE & LIVE RESULTS
As members of the Princeton women's swimming and diving team board a bus Wednesday to head to Boston for the 2010 Ivy League Championships, they will do so with varying views on a solitary goal — winning the program's 21st Ivy League title.
Half of the program is hungry for its first taste of a championship. The sophomores have only the memory of a 2009 weekend in Long Island that went the way of a deeper Harvard squad. Freshmen will get their first taste of one of the most exciting weekends in and Ivy League sport.
The other half knows what it's like to leave Saturday night with a trophy and a weekend full of championship memories. Whether they were part of only the 2008 championship team, or they have been there since winning in both 2007 and 2008, the upperclassmen know well enough that those memories beat the ones from last year by a country mile.
And for two senior captains, it is a chance to put an exclamation point on a pair of the finest careers in the proud history of Princeton women's swimming and diving.
Different classes, different backgrounds. Different events, different strokes. Swimmers. Divers.
Head coach Susan Teeter hopes they will all come together and be enough to wrest the title from Harvard in the Crimson's own Blodgett Pool.
She has been more than satisfied with the performances so far during the 2009-10 season. Since a season-opening training trip, through victories at the Big Al Open and HYP, Princeton has grown stronger and faster and has yet to suffer defeat. Captains Alicia Aemisegger and Courtney Kilkuts have both set Princeton records during the season, and both will look win Ivy League individual titles for the fourth consecutive weekend.
But a conference meet tests team depth far more than any regular season meet, and that is where Harvard caught Princeton last season. When the three-day session begins with preliminary events Thursday at 11 a.m., Teeter will depend on her full team to reach championship finals, or score big in consolation finals. Every point counts in a meet that could come down to the final relay Saturday evening.
There are 14 individual swimming events in the Ivy League Championships, as well as two diving competitions and five relays. Of the 14 individual swimming events, Princeton has a total of 46 top-8 times (eight make the championship finals), while Harvard has 36. However, since swimmers can only compete in three individual events, the gap between those numbers shrinks. After all, Aemisegger has seven top-8 times.
So while names like Aemisegger and Kilkuts, along with Harvard's Katherine Mills and Alexandra Clarke, may be the biggest names in the meet, the eventual team champion will be the one that gets the most from everybody else.
Here is a look at each of the strokes and some of Princeton's key competitors:
FREE
Princeton's best sprinter is junior Megan Waters, who owns the program record in the 50. She earned second-team All-Ivy honors in that event last year and won it at HYP, and she comes into the weekend as the top seed with a B-cut time of 22.68. She also has the second-best time in the 100 (49.92), while sophomore Jillian Altenburger ranks fourth with a time of 51.39 and freshman Carter Stephens is seventh in 51.72.
Altenburger's top event is the 200, where she leads all likely opponents (Aemisegger is tops in the event but has never swam the 200 free at Ivies) with a time of 1:48.05. Junior Ming Ong and freshman Kathy Qu also have top-six times, while sophomore Aislinn Smalling is knocking on the door of the championship final with the ninth-best time.
Aemisegger has the top time in the 500, an event she has won each of the last three years. Her top time this season (4:38.54) is more than 10 seconds faster than anybody in the field, and each of the Top 10 times belong to either Harvard or Princeton swimmers. Strong performances by the likes of Smalling and junior Nicole McAndrew will be important in the weekend's first individual events.
The same holds true for the longer distance events (1000, 1650), as Princeton and Harvard mostly dominate. Aemisegger has the top times in both, including a 1650 time that beats the rest of the field by more than 34 seconds. Smalling, Ong, McAndrew and Lauren Shanley will be important swimmers for the Tigers throughout the distance events.
BACK
Sophomore Meredith Monroe enters both the 100 and 200 back as the top seed in each. Her time in the 100 (54.68) is only .06 of a second faster than teammate Waters, which could set up a big event for the Tigers. Both sophomore Mary Killian and junior Julie Kochman could also make a move into the championship final for the Tigers.
Monroe's edge in the 200 back final is more pronounced; her time of 1:55.58 is more than four seconds faster than anybody in the league.
BREAST
Kilkuts won the 100 breast as a sophomore, then placed second to Yale's Susan Kim at last year's championship final. Those two could be in for another showdown Friday night, as both have the only times below 1:03 this season. One Princeton newcomer to watch will be freshman Sarah Furgatch, who went 1:03.10 during HYP weekend for the third-best time in the league.
Kim has the league's fastest 200 breast time, but Kilkuts and Furgatch both have top-four times in the event. Both breast events have Top-10 representatives from several schools, so these could be events where placing three swimmers in a championship final provides a major edge.
FLY
Yale's Alexandra Forrester has the top 100 time in the league, but Princeton has loaded up the Top 10. Waters (3rd, 55.09); Stephens (5th, 55,52) and Leslie Bargmann (6th, 55.89) could all be racing for top-five spots in the championship final.
Stephens and Bargmann are also contenders in the 200, as is McAndrew is Teeter decides to swim her there instead of the mile.
IM
Kilkuts has won the 200 IM in each of her first three years and will enter the weekend as the favorite once again. Her time of 2:00.92 is tops in the Ivy League (besides Aemisegger, who has yet to race this event at Ivies) by more than two seconds. Furgatch, Altenburger and sophomore Kerry Gruendel could make this a Princeton-heavy final Thursday night.
Harvard has the deeper set of Top-10 times in the 400, although none is within 13 seconds of Aemisegger, who competed in the 2008 Olympic Trial final in this event and is a multiple-time NCAA finalist. If Aemisegger competes in this event, everybody else is likely battling for second. Among those could be Furgatch and McAndrew.
DIVING
An often-overlooked aspect of championship weekend is diving, but that shouldn't be the case. Several times in Princeton's recent title wins, the Tigers have gotten brilliant scores from a host of competitors; unfortunately, many of them graduated last summer.
Head diving coach Greg Gunn still has the talent to score this weekend, but consistency has been the key. From the likes of Carolyn Littlefield, Courtney Fieldman, Christina Kirkwood and Bryna Tsai have come several high scores; there have also been some down weekends, though. Gunn's crew is often peaking for championship weekend, though, and there are numerous candidates to replace Katie Giarra '09 as the Ivy League Championships Diver of the Meet.