The LSU and Alabama rivalry will be played out on more than just a football field this weekend.
The Tigers and Lady Tigers host the Alabama men’s and women’s swimming and diving squads in Southeastern Conference competition today at 1 p.m.
Today’s meet marks the Lady Tigers’ (1-2, 0-1 SEC) first home SEC dual-meet and the Tigers’ (0-3, 0-2) second home dual-meet.
Diving coach Doug Shaffer said his squads have made improvements during the last two weeks to prepare for Alabama.
“I feel like we’re stronger, and we’ve got a lot of our degree of difficulty coming together,” Shaffer said. “We want to defend our pond and compete well against Alabama.”
Shaffer said the squads are excited to continue a streak of competitive meets against the Crimson Tide.
“We’ve got a long rivalry and a long history with Alabama swimming and diving, so it’s always great to have their squads in our pool.” Shaffer said.
Swimming coach Dave Geyer agreed and added that this weekend’s football matchup adds fuel to the fire.
“I think the LSU and Alabama rivalry spreads across the entire campus,” Geyer said. “This is my seventh year here and over that time, this has been one of the funnest, most competitive, most exciting in-conference dual-meets we have.”
The LSU swimmers and divers are also aware of Saturday’s football matchup and are referring to today as the beginning of “‘Bama Weekend.”
“Especially with the football game, we’re really pumped about swimming against them and hopefully beating them,” said sophomore swimmer Torrey Bussey.
Senior diver Matt Vieke, who placed first in the three-meter springboard event in LSU’s last meet against Auburn, has plenty of motivation going into today’s meet.
Vieke said he competed against and lost to a diver over the summer who is now a freshman at Alabama.
“It should be fun to see how our team raises its level of expectations in ourselves and see if we can’t match that and hopefully win both events,” Vieke said.
Junior swimmer Amanda Kendall will compete this weekend in her first meet back since returning from the Pan American Games with four gold medals.
Geyer said having Kendall back helps the women’s squad, even in the events she won’t swim in.
“It helps spread our girls out a little bit, and it helps assure some solid points on relays and in individual performances as well,” Geyer said. “It helps move our athletes into their primary events where before they were filling in events where [Kendall] would typically swim.”
 
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