{"id":24175,"date":"2010-11-05T09:44:22","date_gmt":"2010-11-05T13:44:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=24175"},"modified":"2010-11-09T15:50:46","modified_gmt":"2010-11-09T19:50:46","slug":"huskies-swim-and-dive-toward-goal-of-reaching-ncaas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2010\/11\/huskies-swim-and-dive-toward-goal-of-reaching-ncaas\/","title":{"rendered":"Huskies Swim and Dive Toward Goal of Reaching NCAAs"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"<p>Jessica<\/a>
Jessica Hovancik, a seasoned diver, has recovered from an injury last year. Photo from the Division of Athletics<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Collegiate swimming and diving is not unlike the Olympics, where athletes train for a long period of time in order to compete at a high level for glory during a critical few seconds or minutes.<\/p>\n

Working through several dual meets and invitational competitions against several other teams, collegiate swimmers learn early to \u201cswim tired\u201d through the year to be ready for the league championships, in order to post times that will qualify them for the NCAA Championships.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome kids don\u2019t handle it well,\u201d says Bob Goldberg, head coach for both the Huskies men\u2019s and women\u2019s swimming and diving teams. \u201cSome schools put huge priority on dual meets during the year, and typically those schools don\u2019t do well at the end of the year. You can\u2019t go to the well too many times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Husky teams primarily compete during the same events throughout the year. The teams opened the 2010-2011 season by sweeping the Husky Invitational on Oct. 23, taking first place in men\u2019s and women\u2019s competition over Providence College, Central Connecticut State, Fordham University, and Fairfield University. They followed up their success on Oct. 30 in a series of dual Big East meets at Rutgers, where the men topped Georgetown and Villanova, and the women won two of three meets, defeating Georgetown and Rutgers but losing to Villanova.<\/p>\n

The Terrapin Cup at Maryland and the Bucknell Invitational are the other group meets for the season, along with dual meets against Army, Penn, Seton Hall, Bucknell, and Yale. The men also have an individual meet with Harvard at Wolff-Zackin Natatorium in Storrs. The Big East Championships will be held Feb. 11-19 at Louisville, to determine qualifying for the NCAA Championships, which will be in Annapolis March 11-12 for zone diving and March 24-26 in Minneapolis for swimming.<\/p>\n

\"<p>Senior<\/a>
Senior co-captain Kate Baust specializes in the breaststroke. Photo from the Division of Athletics<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Goldberg says both the men\u2019s and women\u2019s teams look to maintain the consistency they showed last year, while taking advantage of the experience both young squads gained.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do have a small senior class of three on each team, but they\u2019re experienced and important to us,\u201d he said. \u201cThe bulk of our swimmers are sophomores and juniors. So we\u2019ve got a lot of experience. We\u2019ve got a couple of nice freshmen on both sides.\u201d<\/p>\n

The women\u2019s team will be led by seniors Kate Baust, a co-captain who specializes in the breaststroke; Sophie Staskiewicz, a co-captain sprinter and mid-distance swimmer; and Jessica Hovancik, a seasoned diver who has recovered from a late-season injury last year.<\/p>\n

The Huskies also will look to junior Caitlin Gallagher to continue her improved efforts in the breaststroke and individual medley events, and to sophomore Jordan Bowen, a freestyle specialist who Goldberg says has improved since her rookie season, when she had a career best 4:49 in her 500-yard freestyle.<\/p>\n

\u201cCaitlin has the opportunity in the breaststroke to win the conference and go to NCAA. She\u2019s done all the work. It\u2019s her time,\u201d he said. \u201cJordan is just an outstanding distance swimmer. She has the potential to go faster.\u201d<\/p>\n

The women divers had success last season, led by sophomore Nicole Borriello, who was a consolation finalist at the Big East meet and qualified for the NCAA Zone meet in her first year; sophomore Danielle Cecco; who also made the NCAA Zone meet, and junior Kelly McCauley, who was a Big East consolation finalist.<\/p>\n

\"<p>The<\/a>
The men are led by senior backstroker Alex Davidson. Photo from the Division of Athletics<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Goldberg is particularly enthusiastic about the men\u2019s squad this season, citing the progress of his young swimmers between their first and second year, a time he says when \u201ca lot of good things happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pretty excited about the men\u2019s team this year. If we stay healthy, the men\u2019s team may be the best team we\u2019ve ever had,\u201d says Goldberg, who begins his 23rd season as the Huskies coach.<\/p>\n

The men are led by senior All-Big East backstroker Alex Davidson, who holds the Huskies\u2019 100-yard and 200-yard records in the event; senior Tomasz Sobeck, a record-holder in the breaststroke; and senior Tim Krompinger, a backstroke and freestyle specialist who leads by example with his hard work.<\/p>\n

Goldberg is especially enthusiastic about sophomore Kyungsoo Yoon, a sophomore sprinter in the freestyle and breaststroke who, he says, has the potential to reach the NCAA Championships.<\/p>\n

\"<p>Adam<\/a>
Adam Genuario is a senior diving specialist. Photo from the Division of Athletics<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sophomores Karim Zayd, a freestyle and butterfly swimmer, and Jeremy Ramshaw, a backstroke and freestyle specialist, along with versatile Sean Cook and Joe Glowacki, will be counted on to contribute as well.<\/p>\n

In diving, sophomores Grant Fecteau and Anthony Cortright, junior Brad Schott, and senior Adam Genuario will look to add points to the team\u2019s overall efforts at meets.<\/p>\n

\u201cDiving is an integral part of sport,\u201d Goldberg says. \u201cIt figures in the score like the butterfly or backstroke figures. We can win or lose a meet based on doing good or not well in diving. It\u2019s an integral part of what we do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Goldberg adds that he is pleased that both swimming and diving teams continue to excel in the classroom as student-athletes, as recognized last season when the women\u2019s team was honored by the College Swimming Coaches Association of America as a Scholar All-American team. To gain such recognition, a team must have a minimum 3.0 grade point average on a 4.0 scale. The Huskies posted a 3.4, which Goldberg says is the highest GPA the team has scored in recent history.<\/p>\n

The men\u2019s<\/a> and women\u2019s<\/a> 2010-2011schedules are on the Athletics website.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Swimming and diving coach Bob Goldberg hopes the men\u2019s and women\u2019s teams maintain consistency.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[55],"class_list":["post-24175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-04 10:30:51","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24175"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24175\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24501,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24175\/revisions\/24501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24175"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=24175"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=24175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}