Ohio State junior swimmer Lindsey Clary competes at the Big Ten championships in February, 2016. Credit: OSU Athletics
The Ohio State women’s swimming team is set to compete against Wright State in their final dual meet of the season on Friday, just a couple of weeks before heading off to West Lafayette, Indiana, to compete in the Big Ten Conference Championships.
Last weekend the team fell to Michigan 212-88. However, OSU coach Bill Dorenkott said he believes that the score doesn’t do the team’s individual performances justice.
“If you looked at our results, we got beat by a better team and that’s the long and the short of it … If you looked at our performances, we were actually pretty strong,” Dorenkott said. “We put up some of our fastest times of the season and in some cases, some of the fastest times any Buckeye has ever (swam). That being said, we got broadsided by a team that was ready to roll, and that falls on me. That’s not the team, there’s nothing that they did wrong.”
Though the Buckeyes were disappointed with the outcome of last weekend’s meet in Ann Arbor, the team has kept it’s spirits up and use Friday’s competition to prepare for the challenges ahead.
“We’re in the middle of our preparation for Big Ten’s, and while we’re disappointed with how we performed at Michigan, it doesn’t change what our ultimate goal is which is to swim well at Big Tens and NCAAs,” Dorenkott said.
Aside from last weekend’s meet against Michigan, the Buckeyes are undefeated this season and are planning to use this Friday’s meet as an additional way to fine tune their skills before the post season competitions.
“We’ll use this meet as an opportunity to do some hard work, and make sure we’re staying on track,” Junior Liz Li said. “I would definitely say that Friday’s meet is … an opportunity to help us to push ourselves a little bit and be a little bit sharper.”
In addition to using this meet to sharpen their skills and shave some seconds off of their times, the athletes are also using this Friday’s competition to showcase the team’s senior class in their final dual meet at OSU.
“This meet is our senior night, so I’m really excited … to see all the seniors do all of their little ceremonies, which will be so much fun,” Li said. “This Friday is about trying to swim as a team, so we’ve got one more chance to do that (with the seniors) and have fun together.”
Dorenkott said he is looking forward to giving the team’s senior class the praise they earned over the years as well, while also hoping to finalize who will be traveling to West Lafayette in the next couple of weeks.
“It’s a special class, and it’s a great opportunity to highlight and showcase them,” Dorenkott said. “We’ve also got a couple of spots that are still to be determined in terms of who is going to travel to the Big Tens, so we’re still trying to figure out who’s going to fill those spots, and this weekend will help us a little bit with that as well.”
The competition is set to begin at 5 p.m. at the McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion.
