The women's swimming and diving team hopes to keep its momentum alive as they take on Southern Illinois and Iowa State Saturday at IMPE.

The squad is coming off a strong performance at the Northwestern Relays where they finished in second place, along with four team victories.

With this being the last home meet of the season, the Illini will honor the seniors and their contributions to the team. Head coach Sue Novitsky feels that this particular meet will give her team confidence and energy.

"It's always pretty emotional and the team usually gets pumped up," Novitsky said. "We're swimming in our pool. We like our pool. I think we definitely have the advantage being here."

Over the past week, the team has been working on their fundamentals in order to eliminate all mistakes for the upcoming weekend. According to Novitsky, it is crucial to concentrate on fixing these errors in practice because in a meet, there is no turning back.

Heading into the competition, the Illini feel as though they are one of the strongest of the three team field.

"We have a couple different events where I believe that we are stronger in," Novitsky said. "The breaststroke we have top talent plus we have a lot of depth. Also, a lot of the freestyle events we're stronger and deeper in and hopefully we'll perform the way we can."

This young squad is making a strong impression early in the season. With two transfers and almost a dozen freshmen, the team is meshing well together. Whether in the weight room or in the pool, the veterans have taken the rookies under their wings and challenged them to compete to the best of their ability.

Senior Ilkay Dikmen, a dominant swimmer for the Illini, feels that her presence along with other upperclassman holds great weight with the freshmen.

"They are adjusting really well," Dikmen said. "It really helps them if we are in a relay with them because they are shaking and nervous. I think having an older person is always helpful. If you need to relax you can always go to them because they know what to do."

This being Dikmen's last season in an orange and blue swimsuit, she hopes her team heads into this weekend with confidence and poise. She is very impressed with the squad's start to the season and anticipates a successful road ahead.

"I don't think we have ever started a season this well before," Dikmen said. "I'm really happy with my teammates' times and I'm happy with my times too. I think we are going to do great this weekend. I'm not going to say maybe. I know we will do great."

Before each meet, Novitsky constantly reminds her team that each athlete contributes to the team's success. This motto along with meeting the team's goals is Illinois' main objective heading into this stiff competition.

"We've established our meet goals for the year that we believe we need to execute to be successful at each dual meet," Novitsky said. " Every person counts, everybody on the team has a role to play in ourselves being successful. We try to remind them everyday so they can execute."