Senior reflects on career after final home meet with team
After handily defeating both Queens and Wingate this past weekend, the South Carolina swim and dive team is looking ahead to the SEC championships coming up in less than a month.
Coach McGee Moody said this weekend’s meet, the seniors’ last home contest, was impressive to him because a lot of his athletes swam hard to try and earn a spot on the roster for the conference championship meet.
“I think what we’ve been doing is working,” Moody said. “We had some young ladies who rested for this meet so they could try and get a spot on the SEC roster and they swam incredibly. We were talking the other day as a team and one of the guys said how it inspired him to see those girls go fast. So the fact that they’re still going all out this late in the season gives the team a lot of confidence.”
Of the 34 total events this past weekend, the Gamecock men and women were able to post the top times in all but seven events, including all eight relay events.
Senior Michael Flach — the school record holder in the 500-yard freestyle — said the chemistry and closeness of this team is something he’s never seen before in his career at South Carolina.
“The overall attitude coming into this home stretch is probably the best it’s been since I’ve been here,” Flach said. “I think that’s exciting to have a group of guys who are all on board and committed and ready to do something big come SEC’s because that’s what our season is all about and we’ve been working hard all year for.”
Flach says his focus heading towards the conference championships will not be solely on his strongest event — the 500 — but trying to stay balanced so he can perform well in all of the events he will participate in during the event in Athens, Ga.
“I try not to focus on one event too much more than the others,” Flach said. “What’s important is trying to score as many points as I can at SEC’s. I try to have a well-rounded slate of events, whether it be the 500, 200 free, 200 fly, I want to score and final in all of those and then all the relays as well. There’s a lot of focus on several different events both distance, sprint and stroke.”
Before SEC’s begin in mid-February the Gamecocks will travel to Auburn for their final regular season meet against the Tigers on Saturday.
The most important thing for the team late in the season, according to Coach Moody, is trusting in their training.
“The hardest thing for them is to remember their training and to trust us and themselves as we start to back off on the intensity and rest up for the championship meets,” Moody said.