By Dan D’Addona.
The Pac-12 Conference has opened its swimming & diving season, and while some teams have started with a tune-up meet, this week will be the first full week of competition throughout the conference.
The action will span the entire week with meets Tuesday-Sunday in different parts of the country.
Stanford has two meets this week.
The Cardinal start by hosting Utah at 2 p.m. Pacific Time on Tuesday in the season opener for the two-time NCAA defending champions.
On Friday, Stanford travels to Washington State for its first road meet of the season.
This is a different Stanford team, but looks to be just as dominant. The Cardinal no longer have Katie Ledecky, Simone Manuel, Kassidy Cook, Janet Hu or Ally Howe — all Olympians or NCAA champions.
But the Cardinal has plenty of star power with NCAA swimmer of the year Ella Eastin returning after a dominating performance at the NCAA championships.
Katie Drabot also is coming off of a fantastic year and will look to build on that.
Megan Byrnes, Brooke Forde, Leah Stevens Allie Szekely, Kim Williams and Grace Zhao also have had big performances in the past and will be even more pivotal to the Cardinal this year.
There also is some freshman impact on this Stanford team with Taylor Ruck, Zoe Bartel and Allie Raab.
Stanford has won 23 straight dual meets. The Cardinal’s last defeat in a dual was to No. 3 Cal on Feb. 14, 2015—which also marks a string of 21 straight Pac-12 dual meet victories since that loss. The Cardinal has also won 16 straight dual meets at home dating back to Oct. 30, 2014 against Texas (156-144).
The Stanford men also open with Utah on Tuesday.
Abrahm DeVine, Ryan Dudzinski, Alex Liang, Grant Shoults and True Sweetser lead the men’s team that should be a contender in the conference.
The Stanford men will also compete in the Princeton invite this weekend.
On Wednesday, Utah swims at Cal.
On Thursday, the Utah men host Colorado Mesa.
Arizona hosts GCU on Saturday and Washington State hosts Boise State on Sunday.