Discussion of the swimming and diving team often revolves around the program’s impending termination, which will come after next season. As a result, Syracuse’s roster is down to 17.

Despite this, or perhaps because of this, the individuals on the team are as focused as ever. They have to focus on individual event accomplishments because they are unable to score high enough as a team with so few athletes. Fortunately, some of the athletes looking to qualify for top-tier tournaments started the season off strong in the Syracuse Invitational.

‘A lot of kids did a nice job at this juncture of the year, and I think what would stand out because of how he finished was Kuba (Kotynia),’ head coach Lou Walker said.

Kotynia, a junior, finished first in all four of his events and beat his closest opponent by more than four seconds in the 400-yard individual medley. His time in the 200-yard IM was over a second faster than his time in the same race last year.

His goal for the season is to make it to the NCAA Championships. Given the nature of qualification, there is not a set time, but a set number of athletes. Therefore, Kotynia does not have a time he is shooting for this season.

‘I don’t want to say a number because last year I set one, but the times were lower,’ he said.

Stephanie Kuczynski is also looking to qualify at the next level and started strong this weekend. She had better times than at this point last year in three of her four races.

‘It was really good for the first meet, but we can get better,’ she said.

In one event this weekend, the 200-yard IM, she placed eighth out of 20. Yet her favorite events are the 100- and 200-yard breaststroke. They are her focus for the season. In the invitational this weekend, she placed sixth in the 100 and fifth in the 200.

‘I want to get personal bests in the 100 and 200 breast and final at Big East,’ Kuczynski said about her goals for the year.

The good news for Syracuse is that Walker sees potential for improvement, too. He emphasized that the place where Kuczynski should put in the extra effort is practice.

‘She could get a little more out of practice and translate practice to competition,’ he said.

Walker has already seen improvement in sophomores Chelsea Bryan and Eric Vaughn. Bryan not only beat her seed time and her time from last year in the 50-yard freestyle, but also teammates Katie Lewinski and Kucznski, who are both juniors. She tied for eighth in that event. She also improved her time in the 100-yard freestyle. Vaughn improved on all of his times from last year at this point.

It is the individual efforts that help this team keep fighting towards the Big East Championships, despite the setbacks it faces. But whether or not SU achieves this goal, it is still looking to have a competitive season.

alguggen@syr.edu