Both the Yale men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams handily defeated Brown this past Saturday, giving the teams momentum going into the upcoming EISL, ECAC and NCAA championships.

The men dominated Brown, 178-122, winning 12 of 16 events in the process. On the women’s side, the Elis pulled off a similarly impressive win, 183-116, winning 11 of the total events.

After a recent string of tough meets against Princeton, Harvard and UConn in which the Eli women went 1-2, they rebounded against Brown for a much-needed win in their final regular-season meet.

“I thought our team performed really well,” Katelyn Kane ’08 said. “We’ve faced some really tough competition recently, so it was important to come out and swim as intense as we have been recently. The fact that this was our last dual meet as seniors was also in the back of everyone’s mind, and although it was a weird feeling, it definitely helped motivate us.”

The men’s team put on a similarly strong showing against a surging Brown squad, which had defeated Cornell the week before with some strong times. Early in the meet, Yale established itself with a dominating team effort in the 100-meter backstroke.

“Our 1-2-3 finish in the 100 back was a huge momentum changer for us,” Chris Pool ’09 said. “Coming into the meet, we didn’t know how fast they would be, so [for us] to get so many points in one race was very demoralizing for Brown.”

The meet’s neutral setting at Roger Williams University made it especially tough for the swimmers, who were unaccustomed to the setting.

“It was tough dealing with a sub-standard pool,” Pool said. “Due to the setting, our times don’t reflect the caliber of the racing. Fatigue and heat were major issues, due to the abnormal warmth of the water.”

Following their victories, both squads enter the postseason upbeat and will take advantage of some much-needed rest before the ECAC Championships on Feb. 28.

The men’s diving squad hopes to take advantage of its seniority going into the postseason, said diver Jeffrey Lichtenstein ’08, who won both the 1- and 3-meter events, setting a new school record in the 3-meter. Lichtenstein has won both events in every dual meet this season.

“Of the eight active members of the dive team right now, five of us are seniors,” Lichtenstein wrote in an e-mail. “It looks like we are all going to peak at the same [time], and it seems to me that everyone’s head is in the right place. These being our last few competitions ever, I think we’re all committed to give everything we can and go out in a blaze of glory.”