PHILADELPHIA - The University of Pennsylvania women's swimming and diving team is preparing for the 2018 Ivy League Swimming and Diving Championships at Harvard this weekend to begin the 2018 postseason schedule.
 
The four-day event will take place at the Crimson's Blodgett Pool, starting with a pair of relay races on Wednesday and continuing through Saturday. Thursday, Friday and Saturday will see prelims starting at 11 a.m., with championships determined in those same events starting at 6 p.m.
 
What to look for each day…
 
WEDNESDAY
200 Medley Relay - Penn posted the sixth-best time among Ivy teams back in December at the Tennessee Invitational, the team of freshman Quinn Scannell, sophomore Wendy Yang, sophomore Linda Zhang, and freshman Anderson Myers clocking 1:42.90.
 
800 Free Relay - The Quakers' best time this year was 7:21.65, set at the Tennessee Invitational by the team of senior Virginia Burns, Scannell, sophomore Grace Ferry, and junior Madison Visco. That puts Penn behind only Princeton, Harvard and Brown entering the Championships.
 
THURSDAY
500 Free - All eyes will be on Burns for this event, as she aims to become the first Penn women's swimmer to win the Ivy League title in the same event all four years. She boasts the top time among Ivy swimmers this year, a 4:45.52 that she swam at Tennessee.
 
200 IM – Juniors Carter Orth and Nancy Hu have Penn's best times in this event so far this year.
 
50 Free - In the "splash-and-dash," sophomore Wendy Yang has the fourth-best time among Ivy swimmers entering the weekend and trails the third-best time, put down by Brown's Marley Cross, just .01 seconds.
 
1-meter Diving – Freshmen Juliette Pozzuoli (best score 260.39) and Madison Perry (best score 253.88) will represent the Quakers in this event.
 
200 Free Relay - The Quaker relay team (Yang, Scannell, Kim Phan, and Meredith Newman) posted the sixth-best time among Ivy relays entering the weekend. Their top time of 1:33.65 came at the Allan Jones Aquatic Facility in Knoxville, Tenn., and trails the top-seeded Brown Bears by just over two seconds.
 
FRIDAY
1,000 Free - Penn has three swimmers among the top seven teams in the Ivies this year, all of them taking place at the Tennessee Invitational. Sophomore Grace Ferry is at No. 4 (10:01.79), Burns is sixth (10:05.83), and junior Erin Kiely is seventh (10:08.55).
 
400 IM – Sophomore Emma Holmquist enters the weekend with the seventh-best time among Ivy swimmers. Her top time of the year of 4:21.24 is just two seconds behind that of the top three seeded swimmers in the event.
 
100 Butterfly – Penn has four women ranked among the top 16 entering the weekend: junior school record holder Libby Jardeleza is 11th (54.87 seconds), Hu is 13th (54.93), and Myers is 14th (54.98), and Yang is 16th (55.15).
 
200 Free - Senior Virginia Burns enters the event with the second-best time this year at 1:46.79, just 1.03 seconds behind Harvard's Miki Dahlke and more than a second ahead of Brown's Marley Cross.
 
100 Breast – Zhang has Penn's best time in this event in 2017-18, at 1:04.44.
 
100 Back - Scannell has the fifth-best time in this event entering the weekend, a 54.68 that she swam at Tennessee. She is the only Quaker among the top 16 times.
 
400 Medley Relay – The Penn team of Scannell, sophomore Serena Xue, Myers and Burns clocked 3:44.40 at Tennessee. That is sixth among Ivy programs entering the Championships.
 
SATURDAY
1,650 Free – Burns, Ferry and Kiely could all be in the mix here as they have the second, third, and seventh-best times among Ivy swimmers this year. The favorite is Yale's Cailley Silbert, whose top time is nearly five seconds ahead of Burns.
 
200 Back - The freshman Scannell enters the Championships boasting the ninth-best time among Ivy swimmers in this event (1:58.94), while senior Ryan Alexander is 11th on the list (1:59.35).
 
100 Free – Burns (50.52) is the only Penn swimmer among the top 16 in this event entering the weekend, at 14th.
 
200 Breast – Penn has four swimmers ranked 10-18 in this event entering the weekend: Xue is tenth at 2:17.51; Holmquist is 14th at 2:18.64; senior Sydney Tan is 16th at 2:19.04; and Visco is 18th at 2:19.41.
 
200 Fly - Hu finished with the fourth-best time during the dual season (1:59.14), while Jardeleza was 15th (2:02.07) and Myers was 17th (2:02.64)
 
3-meter Diving – Perry is probably the best bet to earn points for the Quakers here, her score of 30.923 against La Salle early in the season is 12th among Ivy divers entering the Championships.
 
400 Free Relay – Penn's best time was 3:24.61 and ranks the Quakers sixth among the Ivy teams. That time came at Tennessee from Burns, Scannell, Newman, and Phan.