2011-2012 NCAA Women's Previews: No. 5 Arizona Women Building Around Incredible Sophomore Class

The summer of 2011 will feature a huge meet in the FINA World Championships, but that doesn’t mean it’s too soon to begin looking at the 2012 NCAA season. Over the next few months, we will count down the top 12 teams from last year’s NCAA Championships, along with a few teams that we expect to break through, until we finsh with the two defending National Champions from Berkeley. To keep track of all of our season previews, we’ve added a link in the menubar, just click “College Previews” at the top of the page.

Key Losses: Dana Christ (1 NCAA Finals Relay, 1 NCAA Prelims Relay), Hannah Ross (6 NCAA Points – Transfer to Wisconsin)

Key Additions: Lauren Smart (Transfer – Virginia), Emma Darlington (return from shoulder injury), Jessica Ashley-Cooper (South African 2nd-year freshman), Shannyn Hultin

2010-2011 Recap: Arizona had an unbelievably young team in 2011. They could have easily slunk towards the bottom of the top 10, and nobody would’ve thought less of them for it. However, they didn’t. Their freshmen class was absolutely monstrous for this team last year, and after all was said-and-done, probably the most valuable in the country. The Wildcats placed all five relays in the top 6, including a 200 free relay that was the national runners-up with four freshmen swimming the four legs. How’s this for scary – in the A-final of that relay, Arizona had four freshmen. The rest of the final combined had only four other freshman competitors. Combined! If that group stays together for four years, they very well could be breaking even the rubber-suit National Records by the time they are done.

The New Sherriff : Let’s address the 500-pound gorilla in the room right away: former coach Frank Busch is gone with the announcement in February that he has taken a position as the Director of the USA Swimming National Team program. We won’t find out how this will affect the program in the long-term until we get deeper into the recruiting season, but the return of top assistant Rick Demont will help maintain stability in the program, at least this year. The new coach is Eric Hansen, who is a former Arizona swimmer and assistant coach under Busch, with his most recent gig at Wisconsin where he coached two National Teamers last year, so things won’t be entirely foreign to the Wildcat crew.

It will be interesting how much Arizona’s general season plan will change – they usually have a big midseason rest for the Texas Invitational, swim pretty hard through Pac-12’s, and then try and hit their peak at NCAA’s. They had a similar season to Wisconsin’s last year, in that both teams finished disappointingly low at their Conference Championship meet (Arizona 5th, Wisconsin 7th) including a costly relay DQ for each. Many of the Wisconsin swimmers, however, swam best times well before NCAA’s.

The big rematch showdown will come early in the season, in Arizona’s third meet, as Wisconsin comes to town for the second-straight year. The new Wisconsin coach is Whitney Hite, who used to be an Arizona assistant, and Hansen will face off against his former charges. That should be a very fun, highly-intense, meet. No confirmation if Wisconsin is travelling to the Texas Invitational this year, but the two programs saw each other there as well last season.

Geer and Crew: Back to the swimmers, Margo Geer was a huge breakout for Arizona in her first year in Tucson. She scored 3rd in both the 50 (21.93) and 100 (47.95) freestyles, and in both races she was the highest scoring freshman (and with USC’s Kasey Carlson one of only two freshmen to score in either race). She was faster in prelims of both of those swims (21.79/47.70). 

Along with her in that killer 200 free relay, including their relay splits, are Kaitlyn Flederbach (21.82), Grace Finnegan (22.22), and Aubrey Peacock (21.96). This coming season, they could very well have all four swimmers under 22-seconds on that relay and will be the favorites to win it all in Auburn at NCAA’s.

The 400 yard freestyle relay returns almost as young, with three sophomores (Geer, Flederbach, and Sarah Denninghoff), though this relay will make an exception for one senior (WUG teamer Alyssa Anderson). Anderson and Flederbach both split twin 48.05’s at NCAA’s, with Denninghoff touching in 48.4. That group placed 4th at NCAA’s, and is again the highest-placing relay to return intact. They will be in the mix for gold here too.

The curve-ball in these relays will be the return of Emma Darlington from shoulder surgery. She missed her first senior season last year with a shoulder injury, but if she returns at full-strength, her bests of 22.4/49.2 will definitely factor into these relays and make them even scarier.

Alyssa Anderson: Alyssa Anderson, older sister of USC’s Haley, will emerge this year as one of the top middle-distance swimmers in the country. As a result of Allison Schmitt’s redshirt, she’ll be the highest returning 500 freestyler in the country (2nd – 4:34.34), and will be in a dogfight with Minnesota’s Ashley Steenvoorden and a few other Bulldogs for the National Title in that race. She also has A-Final potential in the 200 free (1:44.05), and is the defending bronze-medalist in the 200 fly (1:53.79). If she hits, she could be close to a 50 point scorer for the Wildcats. Even if she misses, she’s still going to be good for 35 points.

Denninghoff: As good as Denninghoff is in the freestyles (her flat-start 48.5 was 2nd on the team last year), she’s an even better backstroker. In a freshman class loaded with backstrokers (just like the next two will be), she flew under the radar to a 52.47 and 10th-place finish at NCAA’s in the 100, and a 12th-place finish (1:54.0) in the 200. This is going to be a big year for her to move into the A-Finals and establish herself as a premier collegiate backstroker, because once the high school classes of 2012 and 2013 come onto the scene, all bets are off.

Proud as a Peacock: The most versatile of last year’s freshman class was Aubrey Peacock. She ranked 24th at NCAA’s in the 100 back (season-best time of 53.23) and like Denninghoff will be looking to move up the ranks this year before things go haywire the next. Though Denninghoff had a better season-best time, Peacock stepped up where it counted in the 200 and placed 10th (1:53.78).

She may see a bit of a change-of-gears in 2011 though. Arizona will be a bit of a crowded backstroke group thanks to the addition of Jessica Ashley-Cooper, a South African who was on last year’s roster but never competed. She was the silver-medalist at the 2010 African Championships in all three backstrokes. She followed that up with some great performances at South African Nationals earlier this year with great times of 1:02.6/2:16.6 in the 100 and 200 backstrokes. Those convert to 53.4/1:56.5 in yards, which with a few more small improvements give her a shot at scoring as well.

Where Peacock’s talents could be better used come March for this Arizona squad is in the 100 butterfly. With the graduation of Dana Christ, Peacock’s 53.8 100 fly from the midseason Texas Invitational leaves her as the squad’s top returning sprint butterflier. She already took Christ’s spot in the final of the 6th-place 200 medley relay.I think that her best event schedule for next year will be 50 free, 100 fly, and the 200 back. It will stretch her training out a bit, but she’s got the talent to handle it.

Behind Peacock in that 100 fly is another exciting sophomore – Hallie Stupp – who spends the summer training in Florida with Dara Torres and the aforementioned Kuczynski, amongst others. At 6-feet tall, it only takes her about 6 dolphin kicks and 6 strokes to get across the pool, and she hit a 54.6 in the 100 fly at Pac 10’s.

Smart Money: The addition of Lauren Smart to the roster, who sat out last season after transfering from Virginia, is very exciting for Arizona, and will give them huge boosts in both their butterfly and backstroke groups. In 2010, her yards bests were 52.55 in the 100 back, which put her 8th at NCAA’s, and 52.7 in the 100 fly, which would have left her just outside of the A-Final in 2011. At Virginia, she chose not to try that tough double, though she swam fly on their medley relays, but she could be good for as many as 30 or 35 individual points if she gives it a go for the Wildcats.

As far as the medleys, those times would put her in position to swim probably butterfly in the 400 medley for sure, and probably the 200 medley as well. Smart ended up DQ’ing the Virginia medley in finals that year, so we didn’t get all-that clear of a read on her top-end in the 50 fly, but if she took on the back-fly double that comes on the same day, it would be a good excuse to leave her off of the 200 medley to lessen the strain. Her split on that Virginia relay in 2010 was 23.03 (as compared to Peacock’s 24.10 last year).

She’s also got a B-Final range 1:54.1 in the 200 backstroke.

Baumgardner: After former teammate Annie Chandler won the NCAA title in 2010 and then graduated, Ellyn Baumgardner became amongst the favorites at NCAA’s last year. All of a sudden, though, the country’s elite female breaststrokers got a heck of a lot faster, and Baumgardner found herself in 5th-place at NCAA’s in the 100 in 59.38. Despite improving her time from the season before, and the graduation of the National Champion, she still slipped two spots in the standings.

She carried some big momentum through to USA Swimming Nationals with a third-place finish in the 100 breaststroke in a 1:08.2 that was a second faster than she was the summer before. With that swim, she earned herself a spot on the USA Pan Am Games team The National Champion again graduated this year, but I think that the junior is going to be focusing her attention on the Olympic Trials in the spring (based on the timing of Pan Ams, NCAA’s and the trials). She should still be in the A-final, but it will be tough to win if she wants to do well in both Guadalajara and Omaha.

Baumgardner is also lights-out for the Arizona medley relays, but struggles to add a third (or even second) individual event. She didn’t score in the 200 breast at NCAA’s last year with a 2:12.75, and though she dropped a good chunk of time at USA Nationals, her 2:36.44 still left her outside of the top-60 at that meet. Filling in for that 200 is junior Chelsey Salli. Her 2:11.13 at NCAA’s put her in the B-Final, where she placed 15th for a pair of Arizona points. She’s also got a best in the 100 of 1:00.2 in the 100 that would have scored, but a poor prelims race left her 20th overall last year.

Big Weaknesses: Arizona returns very little in the distance (aka 1650) freestyle, though Canadian Lindsay Seemann has a chance to make improvements there.  Internationally, she’s more of a 400/800 swimmer, but she had a down season overall, both long course and short course. You know she can break out at any time, given that in 2008 she became the youngest Canadian Olympian at only 15-years old, and in 2010 she was on their Pan Pac squad. In the 500, Monica Drake is the number two behind Anderson. The junior went a 4:42.3 at NCAA’s last year to place 22nd overall, and was also a valuable prelims swimmer to give rest to some of the Wildcats sprinting stars (48.5 100 free off of a rolling start).

Arizona only got a single point in the way of scoring in the 200 IM’s last year, and via transfer and graduation, they won’t likely see much difference there this year, either. Anderson might be good for a few points in the 400 IM if she tapered for it, but she’s more valuable elsewhere.

Freshman Class: While Arizona made plenty of additions to their 2011-2012 roster, only a single one seems to have come by way of brand-new freshman recruit. That lone star who will have the weight of a class on her shoulders is Shannyn Hultin out of California. She’s above-average in several events, but her best races are the two IM’s where Arizona needs a good dose of help. She has bests of 2:01.8 in the 200 and 4:17.3 in the 400 Neither of those times is quite in the scoring range yet, but she’s got a few years to build into that elite range.

Diving: Much like Hansen’s time in Wisconsin, diving is not one of the strengths of this Arizona team. After Michele Mitchell was promoted to Director of Operations, the Arizona diving program still sits without a (publicly announced) coach. It’s not exactly clear what this means for the future of Arizona diving, but they do have at least one returning diver who could be something special. Sophomore Sam Pickens placed 4th at Pac-10’s on the 1-meter, and went on to qualify for NCAA’s. She didn’t make a final there in either event (she only dives springboard), but with quality coaching could be a difference-maker.

2011-2012 Outlook: This is the only team out of last year’s top 5 that I look at and think to myself “this team will be better than it was last year from day 1.” They hardly lost anything, and that which they did lose they more than replaced with the addition of transfers like Lauren Smart and returns from injury like Emma Darlington. Those sophomores are scary good. They’ve already announced their presence, and are at the point now to where they just need small improvements to continue to move rapidly up the ladders. Some quick back-of-the-napkin math sees them scoring between 174-180 relay points, an improvement of almost 20 from last year. To me, that already moves them into the top 4. After that, it will depend a lot on whose focus is where for Arizona, specifically Alyssa Anderson and Ellyn Baumgardner. Georgia lost a ton, Cal lost a lot, but both teams also had killer recruiting classes. Stanford lost some very key pieces, but also replaced them very well. Arizona seems to be in the hunt for a National Title this year (which might be a final window of opening with the studs that Cal is bringin in next year).