The University of Idaho Argonaut

The University of Idaho swim team goes into action Saturday versus rival and conference foe Boise State, in Boise.
In last year’s rivalry matchup, the Vandals crushed the Broncos 170-49. 
BSU, then in its first year with its swimming program, only had eight swimmers. Now the program is in its second year, and UI coach Tom Jager says BSU will hold more of a challenge.

The University of Idaho swim team goes into action Saturday versus rival and conference foe Boise State, in Boise.
In last year’s rivalry matchup, the Vandals crushed the Broncos 170-49. 
BSU, then in its first year with its swimming program, only had eight swimmers. Now the program is in its second year, and UI coach Tom Jager says BSU will hold more of a challenge.

 “We expect a very hard meet,” Jager said. “They have two great distance swimmers which will provide a challenge for our swimmers.”
Boise State not only brings to the table impressive distance swimmers, but also a team more than four times the size of last year’s team. BSU’s roster rose from eight swimmers to 25 total swimmers this year — 18 of which are freshmen.

“Our distance girls have been training so hard this year,” UI swimmer Katie Kolva said. “They’ve had some tough workouts and I don’t think they will have a problem.
Kolva said UI has an experienced team.
“We have a lot of depth. I mean, we have a lot of experience ­— their team is mainly freshmen,” she said.

Along with Boise’s 18 freshmen are one sophomore, four juniors and two seniors compared to Idaho’s six freshmen, eight sophomores and nine seniors.
Raw experience makes up the bulk of the Vandals’ edge over the Broncos. The Idaho swimming program is currently in its fourth year.

“The maturity of the class is new for me,” Jager said. “It’s neat that the team seems to know how to take care of business.”
The Vandals come off a close loss to the University of Washington, in which many seniors had season-best times.
“At our last meet, a lot of our seniors really stepped it up,” Kolva said.
For this meet, a different challenge will be provided by Boise State’s diving team, which will go uncontested.  The lack of a UI diving team puts Idaho at a 32 point disadvantage from the get-go, Jager said.
“It’s a lot of fun when you get to face a team about the same caliber.” Kolva said. “It could go either way.”