Coming into the season, the Penn women's swimming team had a goal: third place or bust.
Having only lost to heavy favorites Harvard and Princeton and after beating another third-place challenger, Brown, the Quakers (8-3, 3-2 Ivy) have not disappointed thus far.
A top-three finish may have seemed unlikely to many surrounding coach Mike Schnur's program -- Penn finished last in the Ivy League as recently as 2000 - but victories over Yale (5-0, 2-0) and Dartmouth (3-4, 1-3) this weekend will set up the Quakers as the favorites to accomplish what has eluded them for years: a third-place finish in the Ivy Championship meet.
Schnur said, however, that his team is not focused on jumping over Yale in the standings.
"Our meet with Yale is of much greater significance in terms of pride," Schnur said.
After defeating Yale last year by only three points, junior Megan Carlin said the Quakers are eager to have a repeat performance.
"This year we know what they're capable of," Carlin said. "I know everyone wants to beat them."
Though the meet at Sheerr Pool will also feature the Big Green, the focus will be on the competition between the Quakers and the Bulldogs, which Schnur said is as close a matchup as he has seen in a long time.
"A lot of times in swimming, you know who's going to win in advance," Schnur said. "But in this week, their best person and my best person are pretty much the same in a lot of events."
Such key races include the 100- and 200-yard backstroke between Penn freshman Sara Coenen and Yale senior Moira McCloskey, the breaststroke races between Carlin and Yale senior Susan Kim, and the sprint freestyle races featuring Penn freshmen Lauren Brandes and Andrea Balint and Yale freshman Jane Kim.
"I know that Yale probably has the best sprinters, other than our team," Brandes said, adding that she feels an added pressure knowing her races will help determine the meet's outcome. The team's plan is "to rest and try to swim really well this weekend, because these will probably be our closest races," she said.
As its women's counterpart attempts to make school history, the men's team is merely trying to stay out of the Ivy League cellar in their meet against Yale (4-1, 2-1) and Dartmouth (2-7, 0-5) this weekend. The Big Green currently share the last-place spot with the Quakers (4-5, 0-5).
"The final standings aren't determined until the championships in February, so we don't look at it that way," Schnur said.
Though they may be tied in the standings, Schnur feels his team is superior to the Big Green and is more focused on competing with Yale.
"I don't look at this as a meet that winning and losing is the most important thing," Schnur said.
And keeping close with Yale will all but ensure the men their first Ivy victory.
