In previewing the 2009 Division II Men’s and Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships, Missouri S&T men’s coach Doug Grooms may have said it best: “It’s going to be a meet like no other, that’s for sure.”

Most coaches and participants certainly expect this week’s meets in Houston to be the fastest in Division II history, in part because of the quality of the competitors and in part because of what most of those competitors will be wearing.

The Division II meets will be the first NCAA championships in which competitors will be donning the “new-technology” suits that caused such a big splash at last year’s Olympic Games and have been making waves ever since. The full-body, drag-diminished suits, as one NCAA coach put it, “make moderate swimmers fast and fast swimmers really fast.”

Manufacturers actually introduced the new-technology suits in February 2008, just before the NCAA nationals. At that time, the NCAA Divisions I, II and III Men’s and Women’s Swimming and Diving Committees disallowed them for college competition and later imposed a moratorium on suits manufactured after January 2008.

The committees reversed their decision in September, however, because no research emerged to prove that the suits provided a competitive advantage. “Without any concrete evidence to the contrary,” the committees said in a September memo to the college swimming community, “these new-technology suits will be deemed compliant for all intercollegiate competition.”

While Grooms and other coaches accepted that decision, they appear almost to regret the suits’ influence on the sport. But they’re certainly not encouraging their teams to go without them, either.

“If you’re not wearing them, you’re getting beat by someone who is,” Grooms said.

Drury men’s and women’s coach Brian Reynolds said he and most of his colleagues would prefer that swimmers achieve on their own merits and not rely on technology, but he said the reality of the situation fuels a keep-up-with-the-Joneses approach.

“I’m not a fan of the suit,” Reynolds said, “but once somebody has it, it’s just like having a big driver in golf – once the technology is out there you had better go out and match your competitors or you’ll fall behind.”

Sue Petersen Lubow, the athletics director at U.S. Merchant Marine who also is swimming’s longtime secretary-rules editor, said when the swimming committee lifted the moratorium and allowed for the suits at this year’s championships, it did so because it had no research indicating that the suits add buoyancy as an “artificial aid” – the committee’s only provision upon which to ban equipment.

She said the committee has struggled before with distinguishing technology – which in and of itself is not a negative influence – and “artificial aids,” which are not allowed.

“We had no conclusive evidence that the suits aid in buoyancy. They may help with speed, but where do you draw the line between an artificial aid and technology?” she said.

The committees followed their September decision with a “one-suit rule” in December that, among other things, said swimmers could not wear more than one technical suit (including tanks or briefs worn under the suit or drag suits worn over the suit). To prevent a competitive advantage at this year’s championships, the committees did rule that all swimmers who had met the time standards up to that point would be allowed into the national meets, which eventually led to the committees increasing the competitive caps in Divisions I and III and to allowing a much larger pool of competitors in Division II, which has no cap but will entertain almost 500 competitors at the festival as opposed to the normal 360.

Despite all of that, though, coaches are playing with the hand they’ve been dealt, and they anticipate a record-breaking meet.

“This should be the fastest nationals ever,” Reynolds said.