There is a whole bulletin board of motivational quotes on the pool deck of the Aquatic & Fitness Center. "Put simply," one says, "adversity is good." With this in mind, the swimming team went into a two-day series of meets competing against three nationally ranked teams -- one of which happened to be Auburn, the top men's swimming team in the country -- and came out with two wins.
"I think you can feel a lot more energy in the building," Virginia coach Mark Bernadino said. "Any time you bring in the No. 1 men's team, the No. 15 men's team, the No. 17 men's team, the No. 22 men's team and then the No. 1, 12 and 18 women's teams, you bring that high quality of athlete under one roof, you're going to have a heck of a lot of fast swimming and a really, really good meet, and I think that's what was evident out here this weekend."
A combined meet is generally more complicated than a regular meet because it is not simply one meet with a certain number of teams competing. Instead, each team is competing individually with all other teams there.
Last weekend, the women's team faced No. 2 Auburn and No. 12 Penn State and lost to both teams. The men defeated No. 14 Purdue and No. 23 Penn State but fell to No. 1 Auburn.
Auburn, unsurprisingly, finished first in most events, but Virginia's Fran Crippen and Vanja Rogulji won two events each. Crippen captured the 500 and 1,000-yard freestyle with times of 4.23.97 and 9.08.57, respectively. Rogulji took the 100 and 200-yard breast stroke with 53.53 and 1.58.30, respectively. For the Virginia women, Anna Steenrod took the 100-yard breast stroke with a time of 1.03.84.
Since it faced No. 4 Florida State in its opening meet, the Cavaliers have known the beginning of the season would be a challenge and has welcomed it.
"It's a great thing," Rogulji said. "ACCs are not going to be easy, NCAAs are not going to be easy -- you have to get into that mental state where you just race hard every single race."
While tough races may strengthen the team as a whole, they are especially vital to the freshmen, who are diving headfirst into college competition.
"There's no time, there's no place, there's no reason for intimidation," Bernadino said. "Everyone puts their pants on the same way, and the only thing [the freshmen] should do is experience different race strategies that different great athletes use, and maybe, if you get beat on a turn wall, you'll learn how to focus and turn better."
So far, the tough schedule seems to be working out just fine for the Cavaliers. The men's team is 4-2 overall, and the women's team, while 2-3 overall, is 2-0 in the ACC. The swimming and diving teams will face their next challenge in early December when they travel to Athens, Ga. for the Georgia Invitational.
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