Click the video above to hear senior Julia Mongeau and junior Dan Weinel talk about their goals for 2013-14.


ANNVILLE, Pa. - Lebanon Valley College will start its 2013-14 swimming season this week, visiting Albright Tuesday before hosting its home opener on Saturday.

Saturday's meet against Arcadia, starting at 1 p.m., will be LVC's third annual "Pink Meet" for Breast Cancer Awareness Month, with the Dutchmen wearing pink caps for the occasion and raising funds for the Relay for Life.

In the pool, both the men's and women's teams will try to build on successes from last year's dual 4-6 campaigns. The Dutchmen bring back 19 MAC qualifiers from 2012-13, including nine of the men's 10 qualifiers and 10 for the women.

For the men, the goal will be to keep last year's youth movement going. Of LVC's nine MAC Championships qualifiers, five were freshmen, in a class led by Bobby Burkhart, David Corvino, Clay Heebner, Ian Jackson, and Blade Umstead. Heebner set a pair of LVC butterfly records as a freshman last year, while LVC also returns all four members from a pair of record-break relays: the 200m medley, with senior Matt Dwyer, Burkhart, Heebner, and junior Dan Weinel, and the 200m free relay, with Weinel, junior Timothy Carroll, Umstead, and Dwyer.

Dwyer, who qualified for MACs in five different events, will provide senior leadership for the group along with breaststroke specialist Eliott Bonds, free/back competitor Joseph Chubb, and freestyler Austen Hellerick. The Dutchmen will add five freshmen to the mix, as well.

The women will also have plenty of new faces, bringing in a large 12-member freshman class to mesh with 10 returning MAC qualifiers. Despite losing 12 seniors to graduation, the women have a very strong returning corps led by MAC multiple medalist Jan Ikeda, who has set all four LVC butterfly records, five of six sprint freestyle marks, and both 200 IM records in just two years of competition.

A strong six-member senior class will lead the women's team, including four multi-event MAC qualifiers. Noelle Brossman, Alicia Hain, Krysteena Koller, and Julia Mongeau combined for 22 MAC event qualifying times last year, and are joined by Gabbie Groff and Carli Weldon to guide a young team in 2013-14. Hain and Mongeau each have their names in LVC's record book, with Hain owning all of LVC's distance free and both 200 backstroke marks, and Mongeau specializing in the 400 IM and the breaststroke with four records to her name.

From last year's freshman class, three sophomores with MAC Championships experience return with sprinters Alayna Kalinay and Gio Ortiz, along with backstroker Kendall Mehaffey. A very large junior class includes Ikeda and breaststroke specialists Sabrinia Fellenbaum and Sarah Foery, who each qualified for the 2013 MAC meet.