By Blake Dowson
With a month of down time following a 188-112 loss to Purdue on Nov. 6, the Iowa men’s swim team had a choice.
The team, now 2-2 on the year, could either sulk after dropping two-straight Big Ten meets or hit the refresh button and use the off-period as a tool to get faster in the pool.
“The break definitely gave us a chance to refresh things,” senior Jackson Allen said. “We’ve stayed hungry, and none of us have forgotten about those meets, obviously. It’s really given us a chance to figure out what went wrong and what we can do to change it so it doesn’t happen again.”
Although the team did not perform as well as the swimmers had hoped against Minnesota and Purdue, not all is lost from the early season defeats.
Head coach Marc Long said dual meets like the ones against the Gophers and Boilermakers are beneficial to a young team like the Hawkeyes.
“Early in the season, it’s nice to have some of those dual meets,” Long said. “It’s more about stepping up and racing than anything else. Your times don’t really matter as much as beating the person next to you. And you can carry that into your training.”
Long also said the off period has given the team a chance to grow closer as a unit. Practice day after day can sometimes become stale, but a squad training together for such a long period of time forms a strong bond.
With so many benefits tied to the time off the team has had, Allen still wanted his team to maintain their focus.
“It’s tricky,” Allen said. “It’s a good opportunity to focus on training and getting ready for the next meet, but you also don’t want to lapse into where you forget that at the end of the day it’s about racing and not about practicing. But I think it’s been really good for us to regroup and focus on the small stuff before peak season.”
After a win this weekend in the Hawkeye Invitational, it was apparent the four-week break did wonders for Iowa. The Hawkeyes were crowned champions over the likes of Drury, Incarnate Word, North Dakota, Milwaukee, and most notably, No. 15 Denver.
The Iowa swimmers posted more than 10 NCAA “B” qualifying times at the Invitational, alongside wins in 3-meter diving, 1-meter diving, 400-yard medley relay, 200-yard medley relay, 100-yard butterfly, 100-yard breaststroke, 200-yard breaststroke, 200-yard butterfly, and platform diving,
The championship-style tournament didn’t wear on the Hawkeyes, with their best performances coming later in the weekend.
“Having that break really helped, obviously,” freshman Jack Smith said after the Hawkeye Invitational. “Having dual meets every weekend can really get to you. We had them three weekends in a row. That kills you. Having a break gave us a chance to take a breath, and we swam great because of that.”
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