Wednesday Notebook

SWIMMING THROUGH CHANGE:
A switch in practice routine did not seem to faze Notre Dame last weekend at the rugged Neuqua Valley Invitational in Naperville.
The Irish swam to JS-area bests in four events, including a 3 minute, 42.75-second clocking in the 400-yard freestyle relay. The time was almost 12 seconds better than ND's previous best on the year and 11 seconds better than Galesburg's second-place area effort.
"We ended the meet on a very positive note," Notre Dame coach Derek Amerman said of the 400 free relay finale. "We're almost a full second ahead of where we were at this point last year."
Notre Dame, which is without a home pool during Bradley University's construction of a new recreational center, began practicing last week from 7:30-9:30 p.m. at Woodruff.
The Irish, who also practice twice a week at 5:45 a.m., usually swim after Woodruff and the Peoria Park District's team, the Peoria Area Water Wizards, complete their practices.
"We're still very happy to be swimming and have our entire team together, which is outstanding," said Amerman, whose squad used six different facilities last year and had to split into junior-varsity and varsity practice times with divers at a different location.
Despite being sick, sophomore Becky Stoughton took first Saturday in the 200 free in an area-best 1:55.95. Other area bests came from ND's third-place 200 free relay (1:42.80) and Lauren O'Bryan's sixth-place 100 breaststroke (1:11.67).
"I thought we did extremely well," said Amerman, who thanked the Woodruff coaching staff and administration for accommodating his team. "The further along we got, the better we swam."