Princeton will be the men's swimming and diving team's toughest challenger for top honors in the 50th annual Eastern Seaboard Championships on March 1-3 at Army.

If the Lions can beat the Tigers, who have won the past three championships, they will become the first non-Ivy League school to win the meet.

"Princeton is going to have to be clicking throughout its entire lineup in order to win," Coach Peter Brown said. "I think we can go in there and put some heat on them and stay close."

Like last year, he expects the Lions to stay close to Princeton and Harvard going into the third day of competition.

"Last year was a good Easterns for us but we are shooting for better," Brown said. "Our aim is to swim the best we have all year and qualify people for NCAAs."

Freshman Adam Carroll led the Lions in qualifying by making the cuts in seven individual races. He will compete in the 100, 200 and 500-yard freestyle events. Since coming to Penn State, he has improved his times from when he was the Pennsylvania state champion in the 200 and 500 freestyle, last year.

"I'm as nervous as I was for States," he said. "But it just comes down to getting in the water and swimming as fast as you can."

Carroll said Penn State is fortunate to have a deep enough roster that it does not have to rely on only a few people to swim well.

"It's evenly distributed," he said. "Our relays are all standing on four legs and every leg is strong enough to get the job done."

Qualifying all five relays for NCAAs is the Lions' goal. Last year at Easterns, the Lions made the 400 freestyle relay and the 400 medley relay cuts.

"We are hoping to get our relays there with a mixture of youth and upperclassmen," Brown said, adding that seven of the seventeen swimmers going to West Point are freshmen. "Our relays are about as good as we've ever had them but at the same time the relay cuts are faster than last year. Only about 30 teams in the nation will make them."

Because of the depth of the diving team, Brown is taking four divers instead of two.

"In the past we have done well on our own but this year diving could give us an extra boost," he said.

Also, this meet is the first time this season that Penn State will have everyone healthy at the same time.