With the regular season now behind them, the Eastern men’s and women’s swim teams will head to the campus of Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis for their final meet of the season, the Midwest Classic Championship.

Joining the men’s team in the “Hoosier State” will be familiar squads such as Valparaiso, IUPUI and Western Illinois, all schools the men defeated throughout the season. Also in the field will be a pair of Mid-American Conference schools: Eastern Michigan and Miami of Ohio.

Despite a 9-2 dual meet record and eight consecutive victories, Eastern Illinois head coach Ray Padovan said the men winning the Midwest Classic is anything but a guarantee.

“It’s hard to determine how we match up (for the Midwest Classic), but I’m feeling like we’re going to 85-90 percent lifetime bests to win,” Padovan said. “(Eastern) winning is not automatic, but I’m not worried because we’ve trained all season for this meet.”

The “dean of Eastern coaches” also stressed the need to have big time swims from the men’s squad.

“They have to swim clutch. Hopefully other teams won’t be better, but our dual meet record doesn’t mean anything anymore.”

Underclassmen Tyson Beaman and Chad Croucher have swum well the last two meets with two wins and three second-place finishes in the breaststroke. However, Padovan said the Panthers will need to rely heavily on their freestyle and individual medley corps to win the “Classics.”

“We’re not very strong there (breaststroke), but we have two or three people in the freestyle who are strong and we are fairly solid in the individual medley.”

One of those key performers the Panthers need in the freestyle will be senior Rich Wahlgren. The Palos Heights native has won a team-high 21 individual races this season and isn’t getting any final collegiate meet butterflies heading into the weekend.

“Right now I feel fine,” Wahlgren said. “I’m not nervous at all. I don’t get nervous before any meet I get excited to swim.”

Besides Wahlgren at his best, the Panthers will look for freshman Bill Senese to close out his rookie season with another solid performance. The Amos A. Stagg graduate finished the season with 17 individual wins and has shown his versatility with victories in the 50 free, 100 back, 100 free and 200 free. Padovan said he has already penciled Senese into two events, but the third swim is still pending.

“I’m not exactly sure where he will swim, but I’m going to put him in the 50-free and the 100-back, then he either go in the 100-free or the 200-free.”

While Padovan seems hopeful the men will walk out of the IUPUI Natatorium as champions, he isn’t quite certain the women can make it a repeat in Indianapolis.

“The competition will be real tough,” Padovan said. “It’s not that we’ve gotten worse it’s just that the other schools have gotten better.”

Two schools Padovan seems impressed with is Miami (Ohio) and Northern Colorado. The RedHawks finished the year 12-1 and went 8-0 in the MAC, while the Northern Colorado Bears ended their season 9-3 over including a win over rival Colorado.

“Miami seems to be the best team but it’s hard to figure out,” Padovan said. “Northern Colorado is fairly solid and they have some rested swimmers, but we’re not totally out of it.”

The Panthers will need senior Jordan Sherbrooke to remain hot in the distance and sprint events. The Avon, Ind., native has won 18 races this season and capped off Senior Day two weeks ago with a victory in the 1000-free and a second-place finish in the 100-free.

Also important for the Panthers is sophomore Jenny Curry. After an amazing freshman season, Curry slumped winning only 11 races. However, Curry appears to back on track with a win in the 100-free and a second-place finish in the 200-free on Feb. 7 against Saint Louis.

“I really think she’s back to her old self,” Padovan said. “She feels pretty good and she’s smiling again.”

While the women did slip in the standings from last year, Padovan said he saw a lot of improvement from the beginning of the season when the Panthers were 1-5 though six meets, to the end of the year when Eastern went 4-1 to close out the season. Even though the Panthers are not the favorites he said the women are ready for the “Classics.”

“It was a fairly good regular season and the girls had a big transition after coming out with a 1-5 record,” Padovan said. “It’s a long season and the last two to three weeks we were getting anxious for this meet.”

The men last won the Midwest Classic Championships two years ago and while Wahlgren (who was on the winning team two years ago) says the teams are very different he would love to go out a champion in his finale for Eastern.

“There is no comparison that team two years ago was a 100 times better, but it would be the greatest to win a Midwest Classic in my final meet. To win two out of four years would be stupendous.”

The “Classics” will begin at 10 a.m. with the preliminary events and conclude on Saturday with all of the team scoring races.