The No. 4-ranked men’s and No. 11-ranked women’s swimming and diving teams found success and failure on Saturday against a tough conference opponent.
Senior Arthur Frayler managed to qualify for the Olympic Trials in the 1500-meter freestyle. His performance, however, was not enough to catapult the men’s team to its fourth-straight victory, as they fell to the No. 7-ranked Auburn Tigers 154.5-145.5.
"I think the big learning experience for the men is you’ve got to bring it all the time in this conference," UF coach Gregg Troy said. "You can’t be a little bit off because if you are a little bit off, you lose two races and it’s a whole different deal."
Two major struggles for the men’s team this past weekend were on the diving boards and in the breaststroke races. On the diving boards, redshirt senior Zach Hernandez was the lone UF diver to finish in the top three in the 3-meter diving competition, and no UF diver finished in the top-three spots in the 1-meter competition. Florida accumulated only nine out of a potential 32 points.
On both the men’s and women’s swimming teams, the Gators were 0-4 in all breaststroke races on Saturday.
While their performance in the breaststroke did not hamper the women’s team in their 192-108 victory, Troy said they would be working on their breaststroke and medley lineups as they prepare to take on the Tennessee Volunteers this weekend in their final regular season meet of the season.
The Volunteers’ men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams, ranked No. 18 and No. 9, respectively, will be fully motivated to face the Gators in Knoxville this Saturday for their Senior Day meet. The Vols fell short on both the men’s and women’s side this past weekend to conference-rival Georgia, a team that defeated the Gators in Gainesville on Oct. 30.
While the Gators would certainly like to win the meet on both sides this weekend, Troy said his team is more focused on improving this week as they prepare for the Southeastern Conference Championships in February.
Since the Gators lost to the Bulldogs on both the men’s and women’s sides, they have used the conference loss as motivation. The women’s team has won their past four meets since then, including victories against conference foe South Carolina and in-state rival Florida State.
Senior Natalie Hinds has been the main force behind the women’s team, accumulating 37 total victories since the start of the season, the most by any individual Gator swimmer.
While the men’s team saw their three-meet winning streak snapped at the hands of the Tigers this past Saturday, Troy believes this loss may be just the motivation the men’s team needs to launch them into full form for the remainder of the season.
"On the men’s side, you can look at it as a wake up call," Troy said. "The men haven’t really been challenged since before Thanksgiving. FSU didn’t challenge the men very much.
"I think Auburn was a little bit more intense."
Sophomore Caeleb Dressel has been one of the most important swimmers on the men’s team this season.
Including his three victories last Saturday, Dressel has 30 total wins this season, the most of any UF men’s swimmer.
His performance, along with senior Corey Main and sophomore Jan Switkowski, will be vital as Florida swims closer to the end of the season with both SEC and NCAA championship hopes on the line.
"As long as we learn from mistakes that we’ve made, we’re in a real good spot," Troy said.
"So we’re pretty comfortable that we’re highly competitive and that we’re getting for the end of the season to see what happens."
Contact Sean Doty sdoty@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @TheRealSeanDoty.
UF coach Gregg Troy encourages his swimmers during Florida’s meet against Auburn on Jan. 23, 2016, in the O’Connell Center.
