Fresno State Athletics
'Dogs to Open With Bulldog Invite
10/8/2014 12:00:00 AM | Swimming & Diving
By: Andrew Rich
arich1221@mail.fresnostate.edu
GoBulldogs.com
FRESNO, Calif. -- For the fourth season in-a-row, the Fresno State swimming and diving team will open their season with a home meet. The 2014-15 edition of the Bulldogs will host Mountain West Conference members Air Force and San José State for the Bulldog Invitational this Friday and Saturday at the Aquatics Center.
Competition begins Friday at 4:00 p.m., and then will get back underway on Saturday morning at 10 a.m.
"San Jose State is always good and always ready to go," Fresno State head coach Jeanne Fleck said. "They always have great freshman that come in and do great things. We enjoy swimming against them."
While there is a sense of familiarity with the Spartans, having competed against them back to days in the Western Athletic Conference and continuing with dual meets and at invitational events due to the proximity of the two schools, the same can't be said for Air Force. This will be the Falcons first trip to Fresno for swimming and diving and will give the `Dogs a chance to see a conference foe they wouldn't see otherwise until February at the conference championship meet.
"They've never gone here and we've never gone there, so this is a fun new thing," Fleck said. "Casey (Converse) has done a great job over there. They have made huge strides moving up in the Mountain West, so they are always going to be tough."
Fleck's team prepared for the season opener with an intrasquad event last Saturday. For eight Bulldogs, it was the only action they will see before hopping in the pool for their Fresno State debuts on Friday afternoon.
There are 16 Bulldogs who are in their first or second year of Division I competition, making this year's team one of the youngest in the conference.
Returnees Kelly Simmons, Leah Hatayama and Esme Gullick will be counted on to swim well for the young team. Gullick holds two Fresno State records (200 Butterfly and 400 Individual Medley) and also was apart of the 800 Freestyle relay team that set the school record last season. Simmons was also a member of that record-setting 800 Freestyle relay team and will pace the `Dogs in the distance events. Hatayama leads a strong group of short distance swimmers and was a part of a record-setting 400 IM relay team last season and also part of record-setting 200 and 400 Freestlyle relay teams from the 2012-13 season.
For the second straight season, the Bulldog Invitational will be available on the Mountain West Network. Last year, the meet was the first swimming and diving event to be showcased on the MWN. Coverage can be viewed here beginning on Friday afternoon.
"Any publicity that we can get makes swimming better and our program better," Fleck said. "And for our parents that can make the meet, that is such a huge thing. We have two young ladies from England and their families had watch parties and watched the whole thing in the middle of the night. We have some foreign athletes on our team, someone from Zimbabwe and they got to watch their daughter swim, how awesome is that? For the regular fan, it's just great exposure."
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