Swimming teams to take aim at Army

and Joanna Jacobs There isn't a single member of the Penn men's swimming team who was alive in 1973 --Ethe last year the Quakers defeated Army in a dual meet. Since then, the Black Knights (7-4, 4-4 EISL) have won 23 consecutive meets against the Quakers -- a streak Penn (6-3, 4-3 EISL) hopes to end tomorrow when Army comes to town. It won't be easy. Both teams are almost evenly matched, with Army carrying the advantage of having rested swimmers. Since the Black Knights also swim in the Patriot League, their league championship meet will be next Thursday, and the athletes are tapering for the big event. The Quakers are still in the middle of training. Their tapering will come later. "Army will be rested, and they're going to be swimming strong," Penn captain Jeff Brown said. "That can be an issue mentally if we let it get in our way. We can't think that because they're rested, they're going to swim better. But good teams always find a way to win whether or not the other team is tapered, shaved or rested. We have the talent to beat them." Penn and Army have had almost identical results against league opponents this year. Navy, Harvard and Princeton have established themselves at the top, while Columbia, Dartmouth, and Brown will end the season in the cellar. However, there's a four-way battle between Army, Penn, Cornell, and Yale for fourth place and the next two weeks will determine who gets it. The Quakers need to focus on details -- turns, finishes, breathing --Eif they hope to end Army's streak. This meet will not depend on who wins every race. The meet will go to the team that grabs the second, third, and fourth spots consistently. · It has been so long since the Penn women's swimming team last raced Army that senior captain Alison Zegar has never faced a Black Knight in the pool. But even without recent history to look to, the Quakers still know they have a definite challenge facing them Saturday at Gimbel Gym's Sheerr Pool. "We are going to have our hands full," Penn coach Kathy Lawlor-Gilbert said. "They're loaded. Army is strong across the board, and we really need to be ready." The Black Knights (3-6) are the last regular meet of the season for Penn (2-8). After facing Army Saturday, the Quakers will not race again until the Eastern Women's Swimming League championships. Army is also in this league, but the Black Knights compete in a smaller conference, the Patriot League, as well. The Patriot League championships begin next Tuesday. "The timing of this meet is difficult for us because we're two weeks out of our championships," Lawlor-Gilbert said. "Army women will go to their conference meet right after our meet. That means they're going to be rested and ready to go. We have to be ready to go whether we are rested or not." The Quakers are just beginning to wind down their training sessions. Penn is still positive that the outcome of the meet will be in its favor. Of the last four meets this season, the Quakers targeted three of them to win. So far, so good. Penn beat Johns Hopkins and Swarthmore to put some numbers in its win column and boost each swimmer's confidence for Easterns. Now the Quakers want to finish the regular season as they planned -- with a victory over Army. "We targeted it for a dual meet," Lawlor-Gilbert said. "But are we going to pull out all the stops for a dual meet? No. We need to pull out all the stops for Easterns. So we're targeting them to beat them, but not in the sense where we'll rest and shave. But that doesn't mean they can't be our next victim." As Zegar prepares to swim her final races in Sheerr Pool, she too is confident that Penn can pull out a third victory. "We're psyched to race them," Zegar said. "It's going to be very competitive. We have a definite chance to win, but we're going to have to take it race by race. There definitely will be a lot of close races." As for Zegar, her pool time is slowly draining away. "It would be really nice to go out with a win," Zegar said. ·