By Blake Dowson
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West Lafayette, Indiana, will be the setting for the Big Ten Men’s Swimming and Diving Championships today through Saturday.

The Iowa men’s swimming and diving team, along with nine other Big Ten schools, with travel to the Purdue campus to compete for the conference title.  Maryland, Nebraska, Rutgers, and Penn State will not compete at the meet.

“I think we’re ready,” junior Jackson Halsmer said. “We all feel pretty good. Things are coming together.”

The Hawkeyes have not competed in over two weeks after their last regular-season meet, against Western Illinois. The team has taken the time off to taper their training toward the Big Tens and, hopefully, the NCAA Championships in March.

Iowa assistant coach Frannie Malone said the team has relaxed in the last couple weeks in anticipation of the Big Ten Championships.

“Training has been good,” Malone said. “It’s really just about refining things from this point on. We stayed in the weight room but brought it down a little. The weight room is a big part of our program, but we taper down in there as well. It’s been a light attitude [at practice], and that’s always a good sign.”

The Hawkeyes want to improve on their performance at the 2015 Big Ten meet, held in Iowa City, where the team finished eighth and had 10 top-eight finishes.

Iowa currently has five swimmers with top-10 times in individual events heading into Big Tens.

Sophomore Jerzy Twarowski holds the second-fastest time in the 100 butterfly and the third-fastest time in the 200 butterfly. Senior Roman Trussov has posted the third-fastest time in the 100 breaststroke and the fourth-fastest time in the 200 breaststroke.

Senior Jackson Allen has two top-10 times, including the fifth-fastest 100-butterfly time and ninth-fastest 50-freestyle time. Freshman Jack Smith is tied with Allen for ninth in the 50-freestyle.

The 400-medley relay of redshirt freshman Kenneth Mende, Trussov, Twarowski, and Smith has the second-fastest time in the Big Ten and the third-fastest time in the 200-medley relay.

The Hawkeyes have also posted top-six times in the 200-, 400-, and 800-freestyle relays.

Smith will be a big part of what the Hawkeyes accomplish at the 2016 Big Ten Championships, and the freshman said the upperclassmen on the team have helped him prepare for what his first Big Ten experience will bring.

“I’ve had some international experience back in England, but I’m going into [Big Tens] open-minded,” Smith said. “Every meet is different. All the seniors say you can’t take it easy in the morning to get into finals. You have to swim hard in the morning and hope for a good time to put you in the top eight for finals. There’s about a half a second between first and eighth, so there’s no slacking.”

Although the Hawkeyes finished the regular season with a 6-3 overall record, 3-2 in the conference, the Hawks said they will travel to Purdue this week seeking to surprise the rest of the conference.

Halsmer said the Iowa team competing at Big Tens this year is faster than the team that finished eighth a year ago.

“We want to surprise some people,” Halsmer said. “We’re going to have some good relays, some good freestylers and backstrokers. Our medley relay will be faster than last year. We’re looking to surprise people there.”

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