Eastern Illinois University swim is back, and this year there are seven home meets.  

The swim team has not had more than five home meets since 2013. Head coach Scott Teeters said that he was annoyed with the schedule the last couple of years as they only had one and two home meets the last two years.  

“When I revamped or redid our schedule, we tried to get a lot of the smaller schools off the schedule,” Teeters said. “I feel real good about having a schedule that will allow our kids to be able to compete at home.” 

Freshman Alexander Sadowski said that he is excited for the loud crowds after experiencing them in high school. 

“People don’t know how exciting home meets can get,” Sadowski said. “When it’s down on the wire, when it’s the front two people about to close in on the last 25 [meters] of the pool, it gets crazy.” 

Teeters said that by having more home meets, the team is saving money due to the lack of travel costs.  

Last season both the men’s and women’s teams won two meets during the regular season and then finished last in the Summit League championships.  

Teeters said that this year even with no diving team he wants the team to not be last in the championships. 

“We want to move up in the Summit League. What a lot of people might not know is that going into the doors of the meet we’re down 150 [points] with no diving,” Teeters said. “So last year we would have placed a couple places higher, but diving just did us in.” 

This year Teeters feels confident in that goal as the team has 16 new swimmers out of the 34 swimmers the team has on its roster.  

“We did pretty good last year. We got 12 school records and missed 10 others by less than a half a second. And that was with the crew that was here before,” Teeters said. “And now we brought in a bunch of new kids and then the athletes that are returning are all a lot better.” 

Teeters said the swim team has less resources than most other teams in the Summit League but wants to stay competitive. 

“We’re coming to the Summit League and we’re facing a lot of Division One teams with kids that nobody else really wanted that are developmental,” Teeters said. “And that’s the fun part. We develop them and then they beat kids that they didn’t beat prior to getting here.” 

Another goal for the team this year is to build on the culture from last year, Teeters said.  

Two years ago, the men’s swim team was suspended for the fall semester after they got caught hazing. However, the culture has slowly changed after Teeters became the coach last year, players and coaches alike said. 

Junior Maja Przybylska transferred here from Indian River State College in Florida and said that a main part of her coming here was the culture of the team.  

“This team is not only about dropping times and winning every single meet, but it’s a lot about culture and just growing as people,” Przybylska said. 

Senior Bella Earl is one of the captains this year and her whole job is to be the captain of culture. 

“My job is to make sure that everyone feels like they have a place here on the team and that they belong,” Earl said. 

Even with the new players there are some returners including senior Zach Clark, and he said that he wants to see all new records. 

“Hopefully get some PRs, hopefully get my name and some more people’s name up on that record board, and hopefully have a clean sweep of the records this year,” Clark said. 

The swim team has two main goals this year: To compete in the Summit League and continue to build the culture.  

“If you had that kid next to you from Eastern at the championships, you were going to beat them. And then after last year, that didn’t go down that way at all,” Teeters said. “We had people winning heats and winning races, and now we’re going to get back up on the blocks instead of just winning the heats. We want to try to go to winning events at the championships.” 

Eastern opens its season at home against Valparaiso on Friday at 3:30. 

Patrick Schmitz can be reached at 581-2812 or at [email protected].