Louis Agudelo/ Staff Writer
Winter break was a long one for the Swimming and Diving program at FIU. The Panthers were handed their second loss of the season by the Seminoles of Florida State University to kick off the break at Indian River State College. Of course they followed it up by defeating the former community college of Indian River. Towards the end, the Panthers were beaten by N.C. State, although by a much smaller margin.
So far, the Swimming and Diving team have dropped three contests over the duration of this 2015-2016 season. This can be blamed on the fact that this season’s schedule have featured meets against no less than five ranked opponents, with every loss coming against a ranked program. FIU is a novice by no means, to taking on legitimate competition, and competing at a high level, but this season’s schedule reflects their performance and finish from last season. Bigger and better major colleges are paying a lot more attention to the other Division-1 school in Miami now.
Head coach Randy Horner seems to have an open door policy to any school daring enough to make the trip, or to welcome the Panthers into their facility for a meet. He trusts his team’s ability to not only win, but to prepare themselves in just the right span of time and at just the perfect pace to reach peak condition and form by Conference USA Championships in late February.
The difficulty in this season’s schedule not only lies in the talent faced, but also in the number of meets, with three more this season than last. The 2015-2016 regular season will last at least another week longer than it did in 2014-2015, as well.
Any skeptics of this season’s squad compared to last, should be cognisant of the fact that most of last season’s top talent returned, not to mention that FIU has swept Conference USA Swimmer and Diver of the Week honors four times this season.
Understand also that Horner falling asleep at the wheel of this superior vehicle that he has turned his division-1 program into, is not the problem here. Those three losses, while frustrating for FIU, are not real concerns, from everything Horner has said in the past. To him, it’s not about wins and losses, yet. Not until Wednesday, Feb. 24 in Atlanta, Georgia.
FIU has dropped to No. 20 in the CollegeSwimming.com Mid-Major rankings, as of their last meet against N.C. State. This is lower than they’ve been ranked in quite some time, and will likely be a motivator for this team to work harder now than ever, exactly a month away from Championships. “Holding things together” according to Horner, is a lot of what they’ve really been focusing on throughout this season, which is really all that needs to be done with such a well-oiled machine as is this Swimming and Diving program.
As far as when he believes they’ll be ready, and this was said long before the season had even started “The day before conference Championships.” is that day.
For now though, they have a meet Saturday, Jan. 30 to face the University of Miami for a second time this season, and attempt a season sweep on the. They’ll finish their season against a much improved Florida Atlantic squad on Tuesday, Feb. 6.
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