MACOMB, Illinois, September 26. FOLLOWING the 2013-14 season in which Western Illinois swimming and diving broke 15 program records, the Fighting Leathernecks head back into the pool with the Butler Invitational to begin the 2014-15 season. The Butler Invite is scheduled for Sunday (Sept. 28) at 12 p.m.
“This is and earlier meet than we’ve seen in years past,” said head coach Greg Naumann. “It’s going to be a tough meet and we’re going to see events I normally don’t like to put in until October. We just need to get the cobwebs off from a summer of not racing. Knowing how many school records we had can always act like a carrot you can dangle out in front of someone. Add that to the Olympic trial cuts that were released last week, those are even more of a carrot because we have a handful of people who are close to it. They know that in order to get those cuts, they’ll have to drop those records a little bit and that just pulls everyone else. Everyone wants to beat the guy next to them and the front-runner wants to keep their spot.”
The men are led by five returning All-Summit League selections, JD Furr, Chris Neaveill, Tyler Neaveill, Doug Ogilvie and Dylon Rykosky, and look to ultimately build upon a fourth place finish at least season’s conference meet. Also returning is Matt Abercrombie, who broke three records last season.
On the women’s side, Julia Rasmussen, Paige Wolfe and Mary Betsworth lead a young Leatherneck team into the 2014-15 season. Rasmussen set a Western Illinois record in the 50 free at the 2014 Summit League Championships and sits second in the 100 free. Wolfe set four personal records while Betsworth set personal bests in the 50 back and 100 fly last season.
“It’s a very young team with a lot of raw talent,” Naumann said. “Julia is going to lead the team and she’s aiming for both the 50 and 100 record; she only missed the 100 by a few hundredths of a second. We’ve got a lot of people returning that had success at the end of last season and that’s only going to carry over into this year. Hopefully with all that success we’ll see stronger training in the pool and in our dry-land exercises.”
The Butler Invitational will feature six schools including Western Illinois. Xavier, Saint Louis and Valparaiso will join the Leathernecks and hosts Butler.
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