Swim Team Opens Season Saturday

Oct. 12, 2007

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – The Vanderbilt swimming and diving team opens up their 2007-08 schedule Saturday as they travel to Carbondale, Ill., to take on the Southern Illinois Salukis. The Commodores return nine letterwinners from the 2007 squad. Ten swimmers will be making their debut for the Commodores this weekend.

“Everybody’s excited to get the season going,” head coach Jeremy Organ said. “With a lot of freshmen on the team, they’re real anxious to get out and compete and see where we’re going to start off the season at. Southern Illinois should be a very good competition. They’ve had a meet already. It should be a good weekend.”

Three high school All-Americans highlight the newcomers for the Commodores. Leigh-Ann Axt, Rachel Dyer and Jennifer Molchan should come in and make an immediate impact for the Vanderbilt swim team.

Southern Illinois enters the meet 1-0 on the season after defeating Evansville in the season opener last weekend. The Salukis are coming off a season that saw them win the 2007 Missouri Valley Conference Championship.

“They’ve got a strong program,” Organ said. “Back when Vanderbilt had a swim team in the 80s and early 90s, we always swam against Southern Illinois, so we’re returning to that tradition. They have a very strong team that does well in their conference. I think some of our top swimmers should be able to match up well with some of theirs.”

Complete results from tomorrow’s dual meet will be available on vucommodores.com.