Iowa never stood a chance.
The No. 17 Wildcats overpowered the Hawkeyes, winning every event in a 178-77 walloping Friday night at SPAC.
“I think we did pretty good,” Northwestern coach Bob Groseth said. “It was kind of hard to tell. Obviously Iowa didn’t give us much competition.”
The meet, which was the final time the men’s and women’s teams will compete together at home, marked senior night in Evanston.
The honorees did not disappoint. Senior Brian Davis led all swimmers with three individual wins, taking the 200-yard freestyle, 200 butterfly and the 500 freestyle, and fellow senior Ben Dexter captured the 50 freestyle. Senior Mike Oxman swept the diving competition, winning both the 1-meter and the 3-meter dives.
“I think both Brian (Davis) and Ben (Dexter) had really good meets, which is great to see,” Groseth said. “It was good to see Mike (Oxman) throw in a couple of big dives and get some good scores out of them.”
Facing an Iowa team that was winless in the Big Ten going into the matchup, Groseth took an unconventional approach to the meet. NU’s potent one-two punch of juniors Matt Grevers and Mike Alexandrov abandoned their traditional races Friday.
Grevers, a backstroke and freestyle specialist, didn’t even flinch as he won the 100 breaststroke in 56.76 and the 100 butterfly in 48.55. Alexandrov, who normally swims the breaststroke and individual medley, took first in the 200 backstroke with a time of 1:53.33 and third in the 1000 freestyle.
“Of course those are not events that they normally swim,” Groseth said, “but they did what you want someone to do, and you want them to compete even if it’s their off-event.
“Both those guys are very competitive- hopefully that’s a skill that they can take with them when they go to Big Tens and NCAAs and have to compete hard against guys who are as good or better than them.”
With the typical stars diverted from the spotlight, younger swimmers took advantage and vied for inclusion on the Big Ten championship team that will travel to Bloomington, Ind., on Feb. 23.
Freshman Eric Nilsson, the defending Big Ten co-Swimmer of the Week, had another multi-win performance, taking the 1000 freestyle by nearly 15 seconds in 9:15.82 and the 100 freestyle in 46.68.
“The guys are understanding that this is their time to showcase their skills and kind of make their case for getting on relays at Big Tens,” Groseth said. “The guys are showing the right stuff at the right time, so we’re excited about that.”
While next week marks the end of the dual season for the Cats, Big Tens looms large upon the horizon.
As the team readies itself for the conference championship, practice will become more focused toward capturing the title for the first time since 1930.
“It’s a time that you do a lot of detail work and you try to build good habits,” Groseth said. “Now’s when you work on making those habits instinctual and not things that you have to think about all the time.”
Reach Ben Larrison at [email protected].
