In front of a jam-packed home crowd including Cal Olympians Natalie Coughlin and Nathan Adrian, Cal women’s swimming led Stanford by a mere one point with only two more events to swim.
The Bears had been here before.
The No. 7 Bears found themselves in a similar situation two weeks ago against No. 1 USC at Spieker Aquatics Complex when they were down by 16 points going into the last two events.
Against the Trojans, Cal had to finish both first and second in the 200 IM to clinch the meet. The Bears had two of their stars, Caitlin Leverenz and Elizabeth Pelton, in the event. But Cal claimed second and third, which led to a close 155-145 loss.
The Bears did not want to repeat this against the Cardinal.
On Saturday, the Bears did not make the same mistake, sweeping the first three places of the 200 IM.
With Leverenz in first and freshmen Elizabeth Pelton and Kelly Naze in second and third places, respectively, Cal found itself comfortably ahead of Stanford, 148.5-135.5.
“It was a good last meet — a check-in to see where we are,” Leverenz said. “It was good to see areas we need to improve, like fixing turns, starts and the small technical things.”
Despite the Bears subsequently finishing second and third in the 400 free relay, Cal ended the meet with a 154.5-145.5 win over its Bay Area rivals.
The Bears’ real strength, however, came from the depth of the lineup that had not been apparent earlier in the season.
“We did awesome collectively as a team,” Leverenz said. “The team aspect is huge not only in scoring the points but with the overall atmosphere that a team created.”
Cal’s downfalls earlier in the season to Arizona and USC came from the lack of third- and fourth-place finishes — despite a bevy of strong first-place finishes. In a meet, the combined points of the second- and third-place finishers rivaled these first-place points.
This was most apparent in the loss against USC. In the 200 fly against the Trojans, the Bears finished first and fifth, collecting only 10 points to USC’s nine. Similarly, in the 200 breast, the Bears only collected points from a first-place finish. Much of the meet continued the same way.
In a testament to the strength of its stars, Cal was strong in first-place finishes, and the Bears also exhibited depth against the Cardinal.
“It took a cumulative team effort to understand that no matter what your role is, you have to get that hand on the wall,” associate head coach Kristen Cunnane said. “I thought those people did a really good job of getting their hands on the wall and getting that fourth instead of fifth.”
As the Bears take this performance into the Pac-12 and NCAA championships, they will enter the most important part of their season.
“The main thing for us is to enjoy this part of the season, because this is what we worked so hard for,” Cunnane said.
Jessica Lim covers women’s swim. Contact her at [email protected].