The Irish will travel to Purdue in West Lafayette, Ind., on Saturday for the Boiler-Make-It-Last Chance. The meet represents one final opportunity to qualify for the NCAA championships on Mar. 15.
The Irish (5-5) are coming off a second place finish in the Big East Conference championships. Freshman Emma Reaney led the Irish and added another first place as she propelled past the field in the 200-IM to claim the gold medal for a meet, pool and Notre Dame record time of 1:56.42.
Junior diver Jenny Chiang also won points for the Irish, placing first for the third-consecutive time in the 3-meter diving event. She became the sixth individual to win three conference titles in the same event in Notre Dame history.
Chiang said that the Irish have to bring the same intensity to this weekend's meet.
"This meet gives us the opportunity to focus on being able to perform both in prelims and in finals," Chiang said. "I think the freshmen did a really good job at their first conference meet, and the set-up is much different than any meet they have been to. I think they were able to handle it very well and will also do the same this weekend."
At Purdue, the Irish will face the majority of Big Ten teams, including the meet hosts, the Boilermakers. Purdue defeated the Irish 168-131 in South Bend earlier this season.
"The competition will definitely be difficult, especially since our [NCAA] zone consists of a majority of the Big Ten schools," Chiang said. "It is a much higher level of competition than we are used to, but it is by no means out of reach for any of the girls on the team. It could be anybody's day on the day of competition."
As the season approaches its conclusion, Chiang said the team will strive for improvement and growth while also focusing on repetition of the skills they spent all season perfecting.
"We have all been working extremely hard this year and have greatly improved," Chiang said. "Now that it is the end of the season, this is the time that all your work throughout the year pays off. We have been really focusing on repetition during practice and focusing on strengthening the weak dives in our lists. I personally know how to do all my dives, it's just a matter of conditioning them to be technically sound and consistently correct."
The Boiler-Make-It-Last Chance Meet will begin at noon at Purdue's Boilermaker Aquatic Center.
Contact Andrew Cardoza at acardoza@nd.edu
