Last year went down in the books as one of the best years in Thunderbird swimming history as both the men’s and women’s teams regained their national titles in a dominating performance at February’s U Sports Championships.
But it’s not another double championship year that has head coach Steve Price happy, it’s the amount of young talent that he has to choose from. Only veteran butterflyer Coleman Allen and freestyler Keegan Zanatta were swimming in their fifth year of eligibility last year. On the women’s side, 10 swimmers were competing in just their first year of eligibility. This included stand out performers like olympian Emily Overholt and Canada West record holder Ingrid Wilm.
Still, the young team and their incoming recruits can look up to veterans like Erika Seltenreich-Hodgson, Carson Olafson, and Yuri Kisil. All three swimmers are fresh off competing at the Swimming World Championships in Budapest, Hungary this past July.
The influx of young talent came with a growing trend of Canadian athletes choosing to stay north of the border for their varsity careers due to several factors ranging from the costs to the rise in level and quality of U Sports competition. The ‘Birds capitalized on this last year by snatching olympian Markus Thormeyer away from the University of Southern California Trojans.
But other Canadian universities have followed suit and are gearing up to take on the ‘Birds this season. The three main rivals for the ‘Birds this year are the University of Alberta Golden Bears, the University of Toronto Varsity Blues and the Université de Montréal Carabins.
The Golden Bears still beat the ‘Birds when it comes to breaststroke events. When considering the butterfly, Steve Price will need to find another swimmer to compete against Universiade swimmer Josiah Binnema with Coleman Allen now graduated.
Backstroker Ingrid Wilm will face the biggest challenge of her UBC career in the form of reigning World Champion and World Record holder Kylie Masse, swimming for the Varsity Blues.
In the relay events, the ‘Birds 4x100 metre freestyle relay team will need to dig deep if they want improve on their silver medal performance from last year. But the Carabins still hold four of the fastest freestylers in their hand including olympian Katherine Savard, Camille Bergeron-Miron and the Mainville sisters of Sandrine and Ariane.
With some work to do, Price shouldn’t have to worry too much as the ‘Birds still perform well in quite literally every other event. That’s something you shouldn’t expect to see change this season; so as long as the ‘Birds compete well and stay healthy, there’s no question that they’ll be able to replicate last season’s success.