Despite injuries taking key swimmers away from the lineup, head coach Matt Gianiodis said his team’s preparation this season has been leading up to the Big Ten meet, and he’s confident in everyone’s potential to swim fast.

“I think we’ve prepared as well as we have over my 14 years here,” Gianiodis said. “We’ve really dotted the i’s and crossed the t’s. We’ve had a really tough schedule this year, and the girls have had to face a lot of tough things, and hopefully it will pay off because they’ve done a nice job.”

To rack up points for MSU, the swimmers and relay teams will have to finish in the top 16 in events that might have more than 100 entries.

In the sprint events — such as the 50- or 100-yard freestyle — the difference between first place and 16th place could be within one or two seconds.

Although the Spartan roster carries 35 swimmers and divers, Gianiodis is looking to four swimmers to lead the team in dropping time: senior Becca Ebner, junior Kerry Sodonis, sophomore Jenny Rusch and freshman KJ Burkland.

Sodonis — who currently holds the varsity record in the 100-yard breaststroke at 1:03.09 — not only is looking to lower her time in that event but also is shooting to break the varsity record in the 200-yard breaststroke and get her NCAA cuts. With the success she has had this season, Gianiodis said he would not be surprised if she came home from the meet with both records.

Now in their taper, the Spartans season-long dedication will come down to the Big Ten meet.
“Over the past three years I’ve been here, this is the hardest that I’ve seen our team working,” Sodonis said. “So I think our taper is going to be good, and we’re going to do a really good job at Big Tens.”

In addition to Sodonis, several other swimmers are shooting to break varsity records.

Gianiodis said the distance records have stood strong for many years, but Burkland stands a chance at breaking at least one of them. Rusch has had her eye on breaking the 50-yard freestyle record for a while, and, with the help of her taper, will be set up to break it at 23.15.

Ebner — who already holds the varsity records for the 100- and 200-yard butterfly at 55.05 and 2:00.16, respectively — will be looking to continue dropping time, Gianiodis said.

“If everybody does what they’re capable of doing, that’s one, two, three, four, five, six, seven varsity records,” Gianiodis said. “We could get zero, but it all depends on how we do.”

As the highest-seeded relay for MSU, Gianiodis said the 200-yard medley relay team of sophomore Alex Pierce, Sodonis, Ebner and Rusch also is expected to perform well and bring in some points.

With Indiana — the defending champion — hosting and the depth of Minnesota and Wisconsin, the Spartans have their work cut out for them if they want to finish well.

Helping out the swimmers, the divers hope to pull their weight and land in the top 16 and score some points. In an event that requires mind over matter, junior diver Brooke Sauchak said they just need to relax and let muscle memory take over.

“(I) shut off my brain and then do my dives instead of overthinking anything,” she said. “That’s when you usually tend to mess up, so it’s kind of shutting off your brain and getting into meet mode.”

With MSU struggling with depth in its lineup, the team needs to make sure every start off the block is explosive, every turn is quick and everyone is cheering on deck through all four days of competition.

“We came up with group goals, and a lot of us just want to do our best times and support each other and be supportive on deck,” Rusch said. “We’re not the strongest team in the water, but we want to be the strongest emotional team.

“We just want to go out there and show everyone what we’ve got.”