Women's swimming sweeps Ivy League regular season, looks to duplicate success

Even the best athletes understand that you can't win all the time. Sports wisdom is full of affirmations of the inherent value of the game, the joy of competition, and the irrelevance of the final score: "It's not whether you win or lose; it's how you play the game."

But for women's swimming and diving, Vince Lombardi's maxim that "winning isn't everything – it's the only thing," probably rings more true. After all, no one currently on the women's swimming and diving team has ever lost a dual meet for the Tigers.

With an 8-0 record this season (7-0 Ivy League) and a four-year, 32-meet win streak, Princeton sits comfortably atop the Ivy League. Throughout the season, one by one, the Tigers have successfully taken on each of their Ivy opponents, with seemingly little trouble.

Three-peat

This weekend, they take them all on at once at the Ivy championships, in hopes of winning their third consecutive title and proving beyond any lingering doubt that they deserve their lofty position.

The action begins today at Harvard's Blodgett Pool and continues through Saturday. While Princeton is clearly the favorite, Brown and Yale are also expected to be competitive, and cannot be discounted.

The past few Ivy championships have essentially boiled down to dual battles between Princeton and Brown. While the Tigers have won the past two years, when they captured the title at the 2000 championships, it was the first time in four years that they had not finished second to the Bears.

The Tigers beat the Bears 179-121 in a November dual meet earlier this season. But if any team is to mount any sort of challenge to Princeton's hegemony, it would be Brown. The Bears' versatile captain Dawn Chuck, along with distance freestyler Jean Lee and butterflyer Judy Koonstra, have been dependable contributors throughout the season.

However, Yale, the third-place finisher at last year's Ivy meet, has also been making a case for itself as a formidable player in the league. It is the only Ivy team other than Princeton to beat Brown this season. The Tigers proved they can handle the Elis at HYPs, where Princeton topped Yale, 144-125. Nevertheless, the Elis bring to the meet an impressive 12-1 record (7-1 Ivy) and a cadre of strong swimmers, including a deep freestyle corps. Susan Cooke, Emily Fain and Paige Harazin have chipped in multiple wins in the shorter events, with Heidi Kraus and Laura O'Brien dominating distance free.

The Tigers certainly have enough talent to take on their Ivy foes. Throughout the season, the team's depth has been a key strength, with strong swimmers in most events. Senior Valeria Kukla leads the Tigers in distance freestyle, although she will face steep competition this weekend from Brown's standout Lee. Sophomore Sarah Fraumann has also been a strong distance freestyler this season. Freshmen Amy Jones and Steph Hsiao, along with senior Ann-Marie Casperite, fill in the roster for the shorter freestyle events.

Freshman Chrissy Macaulay has demonstrated skill in the breaststroke, leading a 1-2-3 finish in the 200-yard breast at the Tigers' final dual meet against Columbia. In backstroke, the team is led by senior Kate Conroy. Junior Molly Seto has contributed wins in butterfly, and senior diver Danielle Stramandi has been a consistent performer from the boards.

Princeton — the only Ivy team to have been nationally ranked this season, as high as No. 24 in the College Swim Coaches Association of America poll — has, after all, already proven that it can beat all seven of its Ivy foes. This weekend, the team just has to make sure they can do it again.

Of course, every other team will have the same goal on its mind: to dethrone Princeton. That is the burden of entering any meet as the favorite — everyone's out to get you. But if the Tigers swim as well this weekend as they have all season, they should be out of reach.