ROLLA, Mo. -- The 2009-10 swimming season opens Saturday at Missouri S&T and if recent history is any indication, the Miners could be setting themselves up for another banner year.
S&T posted a third place finish at the NCAA Division II Championships last March -- its third consecutive finish among the top four in the nation -- and also got its first individual national champion along the way. A majority of the performers responsible for those results are back to try to take the Miners to the top of the charts again this winter on both the national and conference levels, where they have won three straight New South Intercollegiate Swimming Championships titles.
The Miners will get their season underway Saturday when they take part in the Show-Me Showdown at the University of Missouri in Columbia.
“We are looking forward to what hopes to be another great season of Miner swimming,” said Miner head coach Doug Grooms, who is beginning his 12th season at the helm. “The guys have been working extremely hard and are ready to race.
“This team has a great deal of experience returning and with the success that these guys have achieved at the NCAA Championships, we’re looking forward to battling again for a podium spot,” Grooms added.
Zlatan Hamzic, the national champion in the 200-yard breaststroke last season, heads the returning corps after an outstanding sophomore season. Hamzic, who set one of the 13 school records at the national meet in that event and another in the 100-breaststroke when he took fourth, figures to be one of the nation’s top competitors in the breaststroke events.
He will be joined in the event by returning letterman Zach Lemons and freshmen Andrew Simek and Alex Griffin. Lemons earned All-America honors in the 200-breaststroke as well last season by taking seventh at nationals.
Another of the top performers a year ago was Andrew Schranck, who earned All-America awards in six events during his freshman season. Schranck was third in the 200-yard butterfly and also recorded top-eight finishes in the 100-fly and 200-yard individual medley.
Schranck will head up the butterfly contingent that will include returners Phil Arve, the ninth-place finisher in the 200-butterfly at nationals; Paul Reinisch, who also competed in the event at nationals, Lemons and Simek, who was the Missouri state champion last season in both the 100-yard butterfly and 100-breaststroke while competing at Fort Zumwalt West High School.
David Sanchez-Turner, one of three seniors on the Miner roster this winter, will lead S&T in the sprint freestyle events and figures to anchor most of the Miner relays as well. Sanchez-Turner won four All-America awards a year ago and has 12 in his first three seasons at S&T, while setting the school record in the 200-yard freestyle and winning the New South title in the 100-free in 2009.
Reinisch, national competitor Hamilton Vernon and Agi Van Wetering, who made the national qualifying marks as a freshman, are also back to bolster the sprint freestyle events, while S&T will also have a trio of freshmen contending for spots in those events.
Sean Deegan, a top competitor at the state level in the sprint freestyle events over the last two seasons of his high school career, is expected to challenge for a spot as well.
On the distance side, the Miners returner All-America performer Andrew Trowbridge, the holder of the S&T record in the 1,650-yard freestyle. In addition, the Miners return junior Danny Murphy and sophomore James Larkins, both of whom competed at nationals last season, while Arve and freshman Matt Welsh will also compete in the distance events.
In the backstroke, the Miners have a pair of All-America competitors back in Aaron Schmidt and Jeff Enge. Schmidt is a two-time All-America recipient in the 200-yard breaststroke, where he set the school record last season, and Enge took 10th in that event at the 2009 national meet.
Along with Schranck, the Miners have several others slated to compete in the individual medley events, including Murphy, Enge, Lemons and Hamzic. Murphy set the school record in the 400-IM last season and won the consolation finals in the event at nationals, Enge placed 10th and Lemons finished in 15th.
The Miner relay teams appear to be in good hands with the return of several key members from last season’s groups. The medley relay teams return Enge in the backstroke, Hamzic in the breaststroke and Reinisch and Schranck in the butterfly along with Sanchez-Turner in the freestyle, while the freestyle relay teams all return three quarters of their contingents from last season in Vernon, Schranck and the anchors of Sanchez-Turner in the 200- and 400-yard events and Larkins in the 800-freestyle relay.
The Miners are scheduled to host two meets during the 2009-10 campaign, as they will take on Ouachita Baptist on Oct. 31 and Truman State on Jan. 22.