Two straight losses leave Brown seeking revenge on w. swimming

Every year for the last few years, the Ivy League women's swimming year-end championship meet has boiled down to a contest between Princeton and Brown, and in each of the last two years, the Tigers have come out on top.

Neither team lost more than a handful of athletes to graduation last spring, so the league powers should be the same once again. Whether or not the result will again favor Princeton is still uncertain, but the Tigers and Bears should have a firmer grasp after this afternoon, when Princeton takes on Brown in a dual meet in Providence, R.I.

Last year, Princeton beat Brown soundly in the dual meet, 160-129 and then thumped the Bears by nearly 100 points in the Ivy League championships.

The two teams have very specific strengths, and gathered most of their points in those areas last year. Brown generally owned the freestyle and individual medley events, while Princeton took the breaststroke, backstroke and diving events.

Brown returns every crucial swimmer to its powerful freestyle squad. The Bears retained every member of their Ivy League champion 200-, 400- and 800-yard free relay teams to take another shot at the Tigers.

In addition, Brown's dominant distance freestyler, Jean Lee, is only a sophomore. Last year at the Ivy Championships, she beat then-junior Val Kukla, Princeton's star in the endurance events, by a tenth of a second in the 500 free, and by 13 seconds in the 1650 free.

The Bears also took the top two spots in the IM events, beating out this year's Princeton captain Kate Conroy in the 200. Though Conroy could not catch Brown in the IM, she smoked the Bears in the backstroke. Princeton took first through third in the 100 back, and had five swimmers in the top seven of the 200, with Conroy leading both.

Princeton held nearly as strong a stranglehold on the breaststroke events, as junior Chrissy Holland and sophomore Lauren Rossi traded places in the top two spots in the 100 and 200.

Princeton will likely sweep three spots in the diving events, as well, with seniors Katherine Mattison and Danielle Stramandi and junior Kristy Wilson running the show.

Barring lapses on the part of either team, the teams' separate powers remain in place. If such trends hold true, the Tigers should come out on top. But with the addition of a few key freshmen on either side, last year's patterns could be adjusted. Thus today's matchup could very well swing on how well each team's freshmen perform.

Princeton has collected two freshmen that are expected to challenge Brown's freestyle sprinters. Amy Jones and Steph Hsiao both turned times in high school that were good enough to give the Bears a scare. Hsiao is also expected to challenge Brown's I.M. predominance.

Despite any struggles with the new setting, Jones and Hsiao have been impressive in early season dual meets.

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"I don't know what to expect, being a freshman," Jones said. "I'm just excited to go up there."

Jones' elders were more confident about the freshman class.

"I think we're more on an even playing field with them in freestyle this year," Conroy said.

Brown has its own new crop of freshmen, however. Their freshman breaststroker Alexis Skoda could very well give Holland and Rossi another color cap to see out of the corner of their eyes.

This afternoon's meet is not as important to either team as the year-end championship meet. Nevertheless, there is a lot of pride at stake. Brown's seniors have suffered three years of cramped muscles, bruised egos and late finishes. Princeton's just have a habit to feed — they've never lost to Brown, so it'd be a shame to start now.