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2024 WOMEN’S NCAA SWIMMING AND DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS
People, we’ve made it: the 2024 Ladies’s NCAA Championships begin tonight. The 200 medley relay and 800 freestyle relay kick issues off in Athens, Georgia and although it’s solely two occasions on day one among 4 , there’s loads of thrilling swimming in retailer for this session.
Final yr, Virginia gained each the day 1 relays and went on to comb all 5 relays, a feat which hadn’t been completed since 2018. The Cavaliers haven’t misplaced an NCAA Championship relay for the reason that opening evening of the 2022 NCAAs once they positioned 2nd to Stanford within the 800 free relay.
The massive selection the Cavaliers have forward of them is the way to use Gretchen Walsh this session. At ACCs, she skipped her regular 200 medley relay in favor of main off the 800 freestyle relay, the place she fired off a 1:40.23 for the third-fastest swim all-time. The relay was solely .37 second off Stanford’s NCAA report and breaking that may give all of them 5 NCAA relay information. Will Walsh make the identical selection right here at NCAAs, or perhaps even race each relays and forgo one of many later ones?
That call dictates how the session goes. If she swims each, then Virginia will dominate day 1. Leaving her off both relay opens the door–perhaps solely barely–for one more program to play upset. Ohio State had an important 200 medley relay at conferences and are the highest seed. In the event that they recapture that might make a run on the title. Equally, Florida may spoil the Cavaliers’ goals of one other relay sweep within the 800 freestyle relay. The Gators set an SEC report of 6:49.65 at their convention championships as Bella Sims led off in a 200 free SEC report of 1:40.90.
Ladies’s 200 Medley Relay
- NCAA File: 1:31.51 – Virginia (G. Walsh, A. Walsh, L. Cuomo, Ok. Douglass), 2023
- Meet File: 1:31.51 — Virginia (G. Walsh, A. Walsh, L. Cuomo, Ok. Douglass), 2023
- American File: 1:31.51 – Virginia (G. Walsh, A. Walsh, L. Cuomo, Ok. Douglass), 2023
- U.S. Open File: 1:31.51 – Virginia (G. Walsh, A. Walsh, L. Cuomo, Ok. Douglass), 2023
- 2023 NCAA Champion: 1:31.51 – Virginia (G. Walsh, A. Walsh, L. Cuomo, Ok. Douglass)
High 8:
- Virginia (G. Walsh, Nocentini, Novelline, Parker) — 1:31.58
- Ohio State (Funderburke, Bach, Zenick, Ivan) — 1:33.09
- Florida (Runnels, Mayne, Peoples, Cronk) — 1:34.30
- Cal — 1:34.55
- Tennessee — 1:34.64
- Texas — 1:34.74
- USC — 1:34.81
- Stanford — 1:35.10
DQs: NC State, Princeton
The Cavaliers wasted no time saying their presence in Athens. This 200 medley win from Gretchen Walsh, Jasmine Nocetini, Carly Novelline, and Maxine Parker is Virginia’s ninth-straight relay win on the NCAA Championships, a streak which dates again to 2022.
Virginia dominated the race, profitable by 1.51 seconds. They touched in 1:31.58, lacking their very own NCAA report from 2023 by simply seven-hundredths. That’s a powerful feat, contemplating that 2023 relay had a 20.34 anchor from Kate Douglass.
G. Walsh bought issues began for Virginia with the quickest 50 backstroke break up in historical past. She fired off a 22.10, eclipsing Maggie MacNeil‘s 22.52 mark by a monstrous .42 seconds. Nocentini adopted up with a 25.79 breaststroke break up, a couple of tenths slower than the 25.49 she swam at ACCs. The Cavaliers made an attention-grabbing selection to go away Alex Walsh off this relay, and went with Novelline on fly. She break up 22.38, then Parker introduced issues residence for the squad in 21.38.
After placing collectively a superb swim at Huge Tens, Ohio State–rocking some beautiful soccer jerseys–improved on their convention championship swim by .38 seconds. The primary three legs of their relay have been all sooner than they have been in February: Nyah Funderburke went 23.44, enhancing from 23.61, Hannah Bach swam 25.68, dropping from 25.92, and KitKat Zenick improved from 22.45 to 22.33 right here in Athens. They bought a 21.64 anchor from Teresa Ivan to offer them a mixed time of 1:33.09 for 2nd place.
Florida’s squad of Aris Runnels (23.82), Molly Mayne (26.71), Olivia Peoples (22.42), and Micayla Cronk (21.35) added .12 seconds from their profitable time at SECs as they took third in 1:34.30. However from a factors perspective, it is a large upswing for them as they have been disqualified final yr.
Talking of DQs, there have been two on this occasion. For the workforce standings race, the notable one was NC State. The Wolfpack have the smallest rosters of colleges projected to complete within the prime 15 with simply six particular person qualifiers. It’s going to be a detailed race for the highest 10, and now the Wolfpack are taking part in from behind. Katharine Berkoff break up 20.35 on the anchor however was the one with an early take off (-0.17).
Inside the prime 8, the opposite two groups to drop time from their seed have been Tennessee (fifth, 1:34.64) and Stanford (eighth, 1:35.10). On the Vols relay, Mona McSharry tied Bach for the quickest breaststroke break up within the discipline with a 25.68. In the meantime, Amy Tang had a giant swim on the Cardinal relay, dropping a 21.23 anchor.
Ladies’s 800 Freestyle Relay
- NCAA File: 6:45.91 — Stanford (S. Manuel, L. Neal, E. Eastin, Ok. Ledecky), 2017
- Meet File: 6:45.91 — Stanford (S. Manuel, L. Neal, E. Eastin, Ok. Ledecky), 2017
- American File: 6:45.91 — Stanford (S. Manuel, L. Neal, E. Eastin, Ok. Ledecky), 2017
- U.S. Open File: 6:45.91 – Stanford (S. Manuel, L. Neal, E. Eastin, Ok. Ledecky), 2017
- 2023 NCAA Champion: 6:49.82 – Virginia (A. Canny, A. Walsh, R. Tiltmann, E. Nelson)
High 8:
- Florida (Sims, Ivey, Weyant, Cronk) — 6:48.59
- Tennessee (Douthwright, Spink, Mrozinski, Fuller) — 6:50.82
- Stanford (Roghair, Nordmann, Mannion, Wilson) — 6:51.17
- Virginia — 6:51.41
- Indiana — 6:54.03
- Georgia — 6:54.67
- Texas — 6:54.68
- Michigan — 6:54.70
Scores Via Day 1
- Florida — 72
- Virginia — 70
- Tennessee — 62
- Stanford — 54
- Texas — 50
- Cal — 48
- Indiana/USC/Ohio State — 36
- (tie)
- (tie)
- Michigan — 32
- Georgia — 26
- Wisconsin/Louisville — 20
- (tie)
- Duke — 18
- UNC — 14
- Arizona State — 10
- Virginia Tech — 8
- Auburn/Texas A&M — 4
- (tie)
- Alabama — 2