A week after trouncing West Virginia in their season opening meet, the Virginia swimming and diving teams return to the pool to face James Madison today at 5 p.m. at the Aquatic and Fitness Center.
Both Cavalier teams are off to a strong start this year after beating West Virginia. The Cav women won 125.5-98.5 while the men grabbed a 132-89 victory.
But, as Cavalier coach Mark Bernardino pointed out, the wins came despite a rather uneven effort.
"We were up and down, as I expected," Bernardino said. "We are a young team and a team that is still learning. We're still experimenting with our lineup and using people in events that might be their secondary events."
The 27-point victory gave the Virginia women (1-0) their first victory of the season and extended their winning streak to 21, a string started during the 1998-99 season.
Senior Megan Iffland earned the year's first ACC women's Swimmer of the Week honors after placing first in both the 100-yard freestyle and 200 medley relay.
"I was far more pleased with the performance of the women than I was the men," Bernardino said. "They swam better as far as race strategy."
The Virginia men (1-0) swam well overall, however, winning the first nine events. Senior Jamie Grimes finished a second off the pool record in the 1,000 free and senior Justin Capuco, junior Matt Lee and freshmen Luke Anderson and Luke Wagner also turned in solid performances. The Cavalier stars of the past few seasons are gone, but a new breed is rising to take their places.
"Some of them are upperclassmen who're coming out of the shadows of the Shamek Pietucha, Ed Moses, Doak Finch, Austin Ramirez group," Bernardino said.
The JMU men (1-1) opened the season with a loss at Georgia Tech, but crushed Davidson on the road. James Madison men's coach Ryan Frost said his squad was looking good after its annual Purple and Gold intrasquad meet, but regressed somewhat against the Yellow Jackets.
On the women's side, the Dukes (2-0) have pieced together resounding road wins against Georgia Southern and Davidson. The Virginia men did not swim against JMU last season, but the Cav women beat the Dukes by a score of 164-119.
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