College Swimming Roundup: Georgia Shows Off

Notre Dame/Navy/Princeton Double Dual

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SWIM NERD
January 17, 2024

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COLLEGE SWIMMING ROUNDUP

🏊‍♀️ SWIMS OF THE WEEK 🏊🏽‍♂️

Georgia Bulldogs Showing Off

Some impressive swims out of the Georgia/FSU/Vanderbilt tri-meet this weekend. Headliners start with, as usual, the Bulldog distance crew. UGA women put up 3 sub-10 minute 1000s, led by the new #1 in the nation Abby McCulloh’s 9:30.61. McCulloh also went a 4:39.58 500 for #1 on the weekend as the Sloane Reinstein and Dune Coetzee joined her for the top 3 times this weekend and Shea Furse slotted in at #5 to boot. Dropping down another distance to the 200, Reinstein’s 1:45.25 was tops on the weekend, with teammates Coetzee and breaststroker Zoie Hartman less than two tenths back for #2 and #3 on the weekend. On the men’s side, 2021 500 free champ Jake Magahey looks like he might be feeling out a new third event for NCAAs. Sure, he took the 1000 in an impressive 8:53.52, but perhaps more impressive was his 200 fly (1:41.81 PR) or his 400 IM (3:42.76). In other strong long distance efforts, Bradley Dunham finished just behind Magahey in the 1000 (8:54.88) and won the 500 (4:17.80), while Ian Grum got the win in the aforementioned 400 IM (3:42.00) - he also swam a sterling 1:40.02 200 back.

Other strong efforts from this meet:

  • FSU’s Peter Varjasi dipped under 43 in the 100 free twice, winning the individual event (42.42) and leading off the 400 free relay (42.53).

  • That 400 free relay race produced a couple of great dual meet times, with Georgia getting the win in 2:51.25 (Dunham 43.17/Branzell 42.34/Hils 42.57/Downing 43.17) over FSU’s 2:52.98 (Varjasi 42.53/Herbet 43.44/Butters 43.41/Yanchev 43.60).

  • Georgia’s women look like they have ¾ of a fantastic 400 medley relay at the moment - Eboni McCarty had a bit of an off first semester but looks to be rounding into form with a season best 51.57 100 back, Zoie Hartman swam a season best 59.16 100 breast, and freshman Helena Jones popped a PR 48.43 100 free.

  • FSU, however, got the drop on UGA in the 200 medley relay, their 1:37.16 #1 time on the weekend powered by Sarah Evans (24.94), Maddie Huggins (27.05), Jenny Halden (23.00), and Gloria Mizuto (22.17).

Notre Dame/Navy/Princeton Double Dual

Some action in South Bend between a rising Notre Dame team and a couple strong mid-majors in Navy and Princeton. Tale of the tape:

  • UND star sprinter Chris Guiliano as usual had a great meet, topping out at 19.21/41.84/1:33.62. That longest distance came in the race of the meet, though, as Princeton’s Mitchell Schott came flying home in 23.73 to erase a half second deficit at the 100 to upset Guiliano in 1:33.40.

  • Fighting Irishwoman Maddie Christman also had a massive meet. She went 52.78/1:54.07 backstrokes (the former a season best, the latter a PR), adding a 21.78 50 free relay split and a 49.35 100 free PR leading off the 4 free relay.

  • The top swim from the women, though, came from Princeton’s South African freshman Dakota Tucker, whose 4:07.50 400 IM came within a couple tenths of her midseason PR, and would have been a scoring swim at 2023 NCAAs.

  • UND’s men’s backstroke group is one of the deepest in the country and showed it this weekend. In the 100, Marcus Gentry led with a 46.05 relay leadoff, but the team also boasted times behind him of 46.10/47.27/47.56/47.75. In the 200, NCAA finalist Tommy Janton went 1:41.85, with DIII record holder Tanner Filion 1:43.28 and Gentry 1:43.33 behind him.

  • Navy breaststroker Juan Mora continued his breakout freshman season, with 52.92/1:59.37 and 24.04/52.79 relay splits in his specialties.

  • Princeton sophomore Sabrina Johnston popped a pair of sprint PRs. She won both individual events, but was faster leading off the bookend relays in 22.30/48.59.

Smorgasbord

A whole lot of miscellaneous impressive swims as teams start to focus on conference meets:

  • Kentucky’s Levi Sandidge booked his ticket to NCAAs with a smooth 14:44.89 mile. That’s the third fastest time of his career behind only his postseason swims from last year.

  • Also in the men’s distance category, Northwestern transfer Andrew Martin became the second man in his school’s history sub-9 in the 1000, with a 8:59.04 effort. First, of course, was open water great (and major player in the fantastic 2017 NCAAs mile race), Jordan Wilimovsky.

  • We also got the second semester return of UChicago butterfly star Jesse Ssengonzi at this meet. He blasted a 46.50 in the 100 fly, three hundredths off his best and four off the national record. With Frank Applebaum’s December 200 fly national record, the D3 men’s fly recordbook was almost entirely rewritten before conference meets even came around!

  • UVA transfer and Italian SCM record holder Jasmine Nocentini continued her strong season with a 21.87/48.40 sprint double, also popping a 26.35 breaststroke medley relay split. UVA split their medleys, and in the other foursome, Gretchen Walsh flew to a 21.92 fly leg.

  • UIndy posted some strong times in a couple dual meets this weekend. On the women’s side, Celina Schmidt continued to make her case as the best breaststroker in D2 with a 1:02.22/2:15.55 double, while Stephanie Markwardt went season bests in the 50 free (23.60), 100 fly (54.45), and 200 IM (2:08.02), and Irish freshman Sharon Semchiy went a PR 2:04.13 200 fly.

  • On the men’s side, the Greyhounds flexed their depth with the top four D2 100 flys on the weekend, led by Mihir Ambre’s PR 47.66. They also had five of the top ten 50 frees, with Joao Silva’s 20.00 leading the pack. They won their first national title last year with sprint depth and are looking very similar this year.

  • Some strong times on the East Coast for Boston U vs MIT. Engineers star Kate Augustyn swept her individual events against the D1 Terriers, with a D3 best 1:58.14 200 back, a #4 ranked 2:03.57 200 IM, and a #12 ranked 1:51.52 200 free. The BU men were led by Kyle Falkstrom who swept the breaststrokes (54.37/1:59.60) and the 200 IM (1:51.06). With Falkstrom’s breakout and Mora joining the fray, it’ll be interesting to see if the Patriot League can push somebody across the NCAA breaststroke selection line with these guys and 2023 double champ Kohen Rankin.

  • Good news for Stanford as they opened their second semester against Pacific with Andrei Minakov, Ron Polonsky, and Zhier Fan all in the fold. Minakov, along with his well-known butterfly prowess, gives some already potent sprint relays more punch with the likes of Jonathan Tan, Rafael Gu, Luke Maurer, and Andres Dupont; and either Polonsky or Fan should end up being the Cardinal’s top breaststroker. If this team hits their potential, they could be leading up the next tier after championship contenders ASU, NC State, Florida, and Cal, and their 800 free relay is probably a title contender after Texas’s big departures with some combination of Minakov, Polonsky, Maurer brothers, McFadden, and Dupont.

🏊🏽‍♂️ Weekend Preview 🏊🏼

A lot of exciting duals this weekend. In the Power 5, Arizona and Arizona State make the Bay Area Pac-12 tour, visiting Cal and Stanford on opposite days. Virginia hosts NC State and UNC, with. Michigan and Indiana open up their second semesters and then Michigan takes on Ohio State, and Northwestern and Wisconsin add another Big Ten dual. VT, Princeton, and Penn State continue their busy second semesters. We also get Auburn/Alabama, Tennessee/Georgia, and LSU/Texas A&M in the SEC.

Lower divisions feature NYU, Johns Hopkins, and TCNJ opening up things early on Tuesday. Oakland takes on Saginaw Valley State and Hope on Friday and Wayne State on Saturday. BYU hosts Air Force and D2 podium hopeful Colorado Mesa. Penn and Harvard rep the Ivy League. Findlay takes the Michigan tour with Wayne State and Grand Valley State. UChicago faces Calvin in a battle of strong D3 sprint crews.

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