The Iowa State swim and dive team will look to finish off its season with a win as they face Kansas in its final dual meet of the season, while also honoring the seniors.

Last week, the Cyclones came away with both wins in their double dual meet against the University of Northern Iowa and North Texas. Coach Duane Sorenson said he is hoping to use that momentum to keep working on the little things and improving.

“It’s like Jeff Warrick our diving coach said ‘it’s kind of like a bell curve where you just keep improving on what you’re doing’,” Sorenson said. “Hopefully we’ll be a little bit better against Kansas and be ready to go for the Big 12’s.”

Staying the path along the bell curve might be a little tougher against a tough Kansas team who beat Iowa State by 561.5 points in the Kansas Classic. The Jayhawks, who are also the Cyclones’ Big 12 rival, were the only team that beat the Cyclones at the Classic, so the Cyclones will look to get a win over them in the dual.

Sorenson said he will be looking at what the Jayhawks swam during the Classic to help prepare for the upcoming dual, but knows that the athletes must be on their A-game and focus on what they can control in order to come out of the weekend on top. 

“There’s no weakness in their team, they’ve got three strong swimmers in every event,” Sorenson said. “We could even be on our A+ game and they could still be beating us.”

Since the Kansas dual is always the last dual before the Big 12 Championships, it is always set up in a two day format, the same as the Big 12’s are, with the preliminaries and finals. Sorenson said they have been doing this for over 10 years to the athletes used to the routine of the of the Big 12’s, with the regular 16 events and the athletes swimming one to two events per session. 

The past couple of years of the dual, Sorenson said Kansas has come out strong and dominated on Friday, leaving Iowa State to have to fight back on Saturday, but he is hoping that changes this year with a better approach on Friday night.

“We almost try too hard on Friday night because we think we have to give 110 percent rather than just giving 100 percent,” Sorenson said. “We have to stay within ourselves and stay within our strength, hopefully we’ll be ready to go and not get too hyped up.”

The Jayhawks also have a new diver from China diving for them this season. They previously had another diver from China who ended up winning the Big 12 1 meter and 3 meter. Sorenson said he thinks that the Cyclone divers will be able to keep up with this new Chinese diver, they just may not be as polished.

The Cyclones will honor the seniors at 9:45 Saturday before the meet begins. This year, there are nine seniors on the team. Over the course of this week leading up to the dual meet, the Cyclone swim and dive Twitter account has been featuring each senior with a post and tidbits about the athlete and what their events are. 

The Cyclones will face the Jayhawks beginning at 6 p.m. Friday and continue at 10 a.m. Saturday at Beyer Pool. The senior day presentation will begin at 9:45 a.m. Saturday.