Being in the national spotlight is nothing new for Texas women’s swim and dive. The program has won nine national championships and 38 conference championships. Fourteen of those have been consecutive since head coach Carol Capitani took over the team in 2012.
When asked what the chance of winning 15 straight conference titles meant to her, Capitani said that maintaining excellence is always the standard.
“Consistent and sustained excellence is kind of what’s expected here at Texas, and so I’m just grateful we have the kind of kids that can help us do the job,” Capitani said.
With that level of previous success comes high expectations. Texas enters the preseason ranked third in the CSCAA poll. Being a top-three team in the country would usually be something to be excited about, but not for this program.
“All my years here we’ve been third, so definitely we’re trying to move up,” junior Lillian Nesty said. “I would say we’re all just trying to do our best and do better than we have in years past.”
This attitude isn’t just something Nesty has. It’s shared amongst the team.
“They’re going to be angry about third,” Capitani said. “We don’t want to be third. I think we want to be better than third. … I don’t really care about what our preseason ranking is. We want to be great at the end of the season, so preseason doesn’t mean a lot.”
While those elite expectations help shape the program and push it to improve, they can also be difficult to handle as an athlete.
“Definitely coming in as a freshman, (there’s) a little bit of pressure, because obviously we all strive for excellence here,” Nesty said. “But being a part of this team and being part of a group of people that all really just want to get better and do the best for Texas. It’s pretty great.”
Pressure can be looked at as a negative, but Capitani sees it differently. For Capitani, learning to embrace that pressure is part of competing.
“I don’t know if we can get them to not feel too much pressure,” Capitani said. “They need to learn how to handle the pressure. We say it all the time, ‘pressure is a privilege,’ and I think (it’s about) changing their attitude about pressure and realizing it’s a gift to have people expect a lot out of them.”
This outlook on pressure helps explain why this team can handle the expectations of joining this program and keep striving to raise the standard.
For Texas, the expectations and pressure that are a part of being elite aren’t something the team is afraid of. In fact, it’s something the team has embraced and wants to push the program further. With the chance to win a 15th straight conference title and improve its No. 3 preseason ranking, Texas looks to exceed the elite expectations this season.
