The Eastern men’s and women’s swimming teams will host Evansville as they open the swimming season 1 p.m. Saturday at Ray Padavon Pool.

Heading into the season-opening dual meet, second-year Eastern head coach Matt Bos said despite having 12 new swimmers on the men’s side, he is expecting both squads to be strong in most events.

“On the guys side we have a lot of new people, but I feel that we have remained competitive regardless,” Bos said. “We have a lot of depth in the sprint freestyles, as well as a lot of depth at the breast stroke events, but at the same time with all the new people it will be interesting to see how we react when things happen in a live meet setting.”

Junior Tim Mathieu, men’s swimming co-captain, said he is expecting the younger swimmers on the men’s side to be able to step up and contribute on Saturday.

“A lot of the younger men swimmers have come in and showed us what they can do, so we are just excited to see them do it in a live event,” Mathieu said.

Training for the season-opening meet against Evansville began eight weeks ago and Bos said this week’s practices have been especially intense.

“We have continued to train and practice really heavy heading into this weekends meet,” Bos said. “Knowing that we have the meet this weekend you kind of want to back off and give the team a little bit of a break, but at the same time we understand that our season is just beginning and we are training to swim our best all year instead of just at this first meet.”

Bos said he hopes everyone can swim their best, but he expects people to be tired and sore.

Junior Alyssa Lehman, a backstroke and individual medley swimmer, said some of the focuses in practice this week have included focusing on breathing techniques, underwater stream-line kicking and stroke events.

“Both teams have been working exceptionally hard at all levels, whether it be distance events or sprinting,” Lehman, a women’s co-captain, said. “We are not resting at all, so that’s good.”

Last season, the Panthers lost to Evansville 139.5-90.5, which Bos said might have been their worst loss of the season.

“Last year, we performed very poorly against Evansville,” Bos said.

Despite last seasons’ loss, Bos believes this year’s team can compete with Evansville.

“I think that we have the talent and the depth on both sides to come back and reverse what happened last year,” Bos said.

Neil Schneider can be reached at 581-7944 or

jnschneider@eiu.edu.