Coming off a huge win over N.C. State, the Virginia swimming and diving teams will face a double whammy this weekend when they compete against Duke tomorrow and then against North Carolina Sunday.
The women's team enters the weekend ranked 17th and is looking to build off of a strong performance against N.C. State. Last weekend, the Cavaliers won all nine swimming events against the Wolfpack on the way to its 147-91 victory, and seven different swimmers won events for Virginia leading coach Mark Bernardino.
The Virginia squad expects a close competition against the talented North Carolina team this weekend.
"Over the history of ACC women's swimming there has not been a team that's been better than North Carolina," Bernardino said. "We've been working as hard as we can to be competitive with them, and in the last decade it's gone back and forth. We anticipate a great contest with them."
Against the Tar Heels, Virginia will look for big performances from sophomore Rachel Burke, who won the 1000-freestyle and placed second in the 500-free last weekend and from freshman Shannon Hogan, who won two events against N.C. State.
"We've been working really hard, not only to swim fast against UNC, but for the rest of the season," said Hogan, who swam her collegiate best times in her 50- and 100-freestyle victories last weekend. "I'm just so excited to see how we do [this] weekend."
Duke's women have not won in ACC competition this year, including a 121-120 heartbreaking loss to N.C. State Jan. 19. Duke won the 400-freestyle relay but lost the meet because N.C. State's teams finished with second and third to steal the victory from the Blue Devils.
The 11th-ranked men's team will look to crack into the top-10 this weekend. The men's team has been consistent all season, winning every head-to-head meet this year except for an early season loss to Auburn. The men's team has also done well competing at large meets with a third place finish at the Texas A&M Invitational. Despite all of the success this season, Bernardino is not overlooking this weekend's competition.
"UNC is a deep team, and their depth presents a problem to us, so we've got to stay consistent from top to bottom in our lineup," Bernardino said. "We can't have a bad event and we can't have any mental letdowns."
North Carolina recently won its 500th dual meet victory with a 153-101 victory over Johns Hopkins Wednesday. In the meet, the 22nd-ranked Tar Heels won 13 of 14 events and had 11 different competitors win individually.
Virginia will be led by senior Luke Wagner, junior Michael Raab and sophomore Fran Crippen. Last weekend, all three won their individual events. Wagner and Raab also teamed with freshman Vanja Rogulj and senior Jon Haag to win the 400-medley relay.
Virginia will also look for divers, senior Pete Amstutz and sophomore Andrew Barber, to continue with their recent strong performances. Against N.C. State both men broke Amstutz's school records in the one-meter and three-meter dive competition.
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