As the Eastern men’s and women’s swimming teams prepare for their last meet with head coach Ray Padovan, the search for Padovan’s successor continues.

But the new swimming coach will not be determined until Eastern announces its new athletic director.

If the athletic director search goes much longer, it may hurt the swimming team in the long run in areas such as recruiting.

“The longer they wait, the longer it hurts us,” Padovan said. “I read in the paper that they were going to wait (on their selection), and if they wait until July that really hurts our team.”

A candidate mentioned as Padovan’s successor is former Eastern swimmer Matt Boss, a former graduate assistant and most recently a swimming coach in Texas.

“He’s the only candidate whose name has been shooting around our team,” senior Tim O’Hagan said. “One of his club teams in Texas recently got a new record in the 100-yard freestyle. We’re hoping he takes all of his knowledge and brings that here.”

Laird, freshmen excel before conference meet

It is the people that do the little things right that excel and get to conference. A good example of this would be junior diver Joe Laird, who qualified for the zone championships and will compete for a spot for the national championships based on his performance this weekend against Saint Louis.

“Joe is a good diver,” Padovan said. “He’s gotten beat by the Western (Illinois) divers, but he’s beaten (Indiana-Purdue-Indianapolis) and their No. 1. He did a great job this past weekend in the 1-meter. He’s competitive with the top four divers.”

During the last meet against Saint Louis, Laird set an Eastern record for the 1-meter diving competition (304.80 points). His performance will be key for Eastern at the conference meet.

“He’s done very well against IUPUI who is tough,” O’Hagan said. “He could score some good points for the 1 and 3-meter dive for us.”

The men’s swim team had some standout freshmen this year, as Caleb Arthur and Matt Scaliatine both have had solid seasons.

“They are important,” O’Hagan said. “Arthur has stepped up real well in the relays. There’s two seats in the freestyle relay, so he’s trying to get one of those. Scaliatine is a real strong swimmer and has filled the breaststroke well for us.”

Panthers taper for conference meet

The Summit League Championship on Feb. 21-23 in Rochester, Mich., is less than three weeks away for Eastern’s men’s and women’s swimming teams. The women’s team will be able to take all of their swimmers with, while the men, who have a much bigger team than the women, will have to leave some individuals behind because of a travel budget.

“Right now we’re 17 days from conference,” Padovan said. “Today and tomorrow, we’re going to be dropping the yardage. We keep cutting back a little bit each day, and it’s a two plus week process.”

With the cuts for the conference meet, the men’s team will likely be affected by the loss of individuals at practice.

“It’s going to be tough,” O’Hagan said. “In practice we’ll be working on stroke technique, starts and finishes, and we’ll go back to working on the little things.”

The women’s team will be looking for individuals to step up at the conference meet, as they didn’t need to cut anybody out for the league meet.

“We really need everyone to step up,” Padovan said. “Our key people (sophomore Lauren) Zillmer, (sophomore Laura) Nilsen, (senior Patty) Young and our freshmen are ready to do something at the conference meet. It’s really a team effort. Hopefully everybody will score and hopefully someone will step up in a relay.”

Senior Jen Beresheim said all of the races at conference would be important.

“I believe the medley relay, since it is the first relay of the meet, is always key,” Beresheim said. “If we start out strong, we are able to come back positive and the motivation behind it helps. This year we struggled getting the time and our record wasn’t what we hoped for.”

Ross Meister can be reached at 581-7944 or at rwmeister@eiu.edu.

Junior diver Kara Kooken finishes her dive during the 1 meter diving competition against St. Louis University at Lantz Natatorium Saturday Afternoon. (John Bailey/The Daily Eastern News)

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