2018 ACC Men’s Champs: Day 4 Prelims Live Recap

2018 ACC MEN’S CHAMPIONSHIPS

• When: Wednesday, February 21st to Saturday, February 24th | Prelims 10:00am | Finals 6:00pm
• Where: Greensboro Aquatics Center, Greensboro, NC (Eastern Time Zone)
• Defending Champion: NC State Wolfpack (results) fix
• Psych Sheet: here
• Live Results: here
• Streaming: WatchESPN (subscription required)
• Championship Central: here

All good things must come to an end, and the final day of the 2018 ACC championships is here.  As expected, NC State and Louisville are pretty well locked into 1st and 2nd place, respectively, but there’s still a battle brewing for the next few spots. Here’s where the 3rd-5th place teams currently stand, including their platform diving points:

Florida State – 642.5
Notre Dame – 640
Virginia – 604.5

Florida State has five swimmers seeded in the top eight for today’s events, Virginia has four, and Notre Dame has three, so this looks to continue to be a tight race throughout the day.

Individually, Hennessey Stuart is the top seed in the 200 back, and the Wolfpack swimmer and conference record holder will be swimming to reclaim his conference title.  In the 100 free, Justin Ress is listed first on the psych sheet with a 42.40, but NC State teammate Ryan Held is the defending champion in the event, and the two should battle it out this evening.  Fellow team member Andreas Vazaios holds the fastest time in the 200 fly, and he too is gunning for a title defense, as is Anton Ipsen in the 1650, which will be contested starting this afternoon.

Louisville senior Carlos Claverie has the top seed in the 200 breast, and he’ll be looking for a conference title after losing to teammate Evgenii Somov yesterday in the 100 breast.

200 BACKSTROKE

NCAA A Cut: 1:39.66
NCAA B Cut: 1:46.39
2017 Invite Time: 1:41.74
Conference Record: Hennessey Stuart, NC State, 1:38.56 (2016)
Meet Record: Grigory Tarasevich, Louisville, 1:39.05 (2017)
Defending Champion: Grigory Tarasevich, Louisville

Top Eight:

1. Robert Whitacre, Notre Dame, 1:40.17
2. Coleman Stewart, NC State 1:40.65
3. Hennessey Stuart, NC State, 1:40.91
4. Robby Giller, Virginia, 1:41.37
5. Brendan Casey, Virginia, 1:41.86
6. Colton Williamson, Georgia Tech, 1:41.89
7. Jack Montesi, Notre Dame, 1:42.06
8. Nikkos Sofianidis, Louisville, 1:42.23

2nd-seeded Robert Whitacre knocked just over a second off of his seed time to swim the swiftest time of the morning in the next-to-last heat.  Teammate Jack Montesi will give the Fighting Irish two men in tonight’s A-final after beating his seed time by over three seconds.

NC State took the 2nd and 3rd spots, courtesy of a pair of 1:40 swims.  Hennessey Stuartholds the conference record, but Coleman Stewart has been setting the pool on fire this week, and we should see a great battle tonight for the title.

The Cavaliers matched Notre Dame and NC State with two A-finalists of their own: Brendan Casey, last night’s 3rd place finisher in the 400 IM, and Robby Giller, who dropped almost three seconds to earn his third A-final of the meet.  Georgia Tech’s Colton Williamson and Louisville’s Nikkos Sofianidis will round out tonight’s championship final.

Florida State, who is battling with Virginia and Notre Dame for 3rd place, as Connor Kalisz, who was seeded 4th, finished 16th in this morning’s preliminaries.

100 FREE

NCAA A Cut: 42:11
NCAA B Cut: 44.29
2017 Invite Time: 42.76
Conference Record: Simonas Billis, NC State, 41.18 (2016)
Meet Record: Ryan Held, NC State, 41.61 (2017)
Defending Champion: Ryan Held, NC State

Top Eight:

1. Justin Ress, NC State, 41.74
2. Jacob Molacek, NC State, 42.01
3. Ryan Held, NC State, 42.10
4. Will Pisani, Florida State, 42.73
5. Andrej Barna, Louisville, 42.77
6. Giovanni Izzo, NC State 42.86
7. Daniel Speers, Notre Dame, 42.88
8. Emir Muratovic, Florida State, 43.08

Justin Ress rocked a 41.74 in the final heat to take the top seed heading into tonight.  As expected, he’ll be joined by teammates Jacob Molacek, Ryan Held, and Giovanni Izzo, and while Held is the defending champion, you got to believe that his teammates are not going to let him walk away with an easy victory.

Florida State bounced back after a rough 200 back to put two men into the A-final, Will Pisani and Emir Muratovic, knocking a pair of UVA swimmers, Joe Clark and Bryce Keblish, into 9th and 10th place in the process.  Notre Dame got one swimmer into the A-final, Daniel Speers, and Louisville’s Andrej Barna will head into tonight’s final seeded 5th.

200 BREAST

NCAA A Cut: 1:52.94
NCAA B Cut: 1:59.79
2017 Invite Time: 1:54.54
Conference Record: Brandon Fiala, Virginia Tech, 1:52.39 (2017)
Meet Record: Brandon Fiala, Virginia Tech, 1:52.39 (2017)
Defending Champion: Brandon Fiala, Virginia Tech

Top Eight:

1. Moises Loschi, Georgia Tech, 1:54.23
2. Matthew Otto, Virginia, 1:54.34
3. Carlos Claverie, Louisville, 1:54.57
4. Evgenii Somov, Louisville, 1:54.59
5. Michael McBryan, UNC, 1:54.98
6. Keefer Barnum, Virginia, 1:55.08
7. Judd Howard, Duke, 1:55.31
8. Caio Pumputis, Georgia Tech, 1:55.68

For the second day in a row, there will be no NC State swimmers in the A-final of the breaststroke event, and again, it was a close thing, with Daniel Graber finishing 9th, less than three-tenths of a second off what it took to crack the top eight.

Instead, three different schools will have two swimmers in tonight’s A-final.

Georgia Tech’s Moises Loschi led the way this morning with a 1:54.23, while teammate Caio Pumputis, who had the 2nd-fastest psych sheet time, just squeaked into the top eight with a 1:55.68.

The Cavaliers put up a brace of breaststrokers as well, with Matthew Otto just behind Loschi with a 1:54.34 and fellow freshman Keefer Barnum swimming to a 1:55.08.

There will be some serious freshman firepower tonight, as Pumputis, the Virginia duo, and Louisville’s Evengii Somov (1:54.59) will fill four of the eight lanes.

Somov’s teammate Carlos Claverie (1:54.57) and UNC’s Michael McBryan (1:54.98) will also be in contention for what promises to be a tight fight for the title, as six of the top eight swimmers were within a second of each other.

200 FLY

NCAA A Cut: 1:41.44
NCAA B Cut: 1:47.99
2017 Invite Time: 1:43.09
Conference Record: Andreas Vazaios, NC State, 1:40.77 (2017)
Meet Record: Christian McCurdy (2016) & Andreas Vazaios (2017) NC State, 1:41.42
Defending Champion: Andreas Vazaios, NC State

Top Eight:

1. Nicolas Albiero, Louisville, 1:41.61
2. Andreas Vazaios, NC State, 1:41.69
3. Ted Schubert, Virginia, 1:42.00
4. Zach Harting, Louisville, 1:42.22
5. James Bretscher, NC State 1:42.61
6. Zach Fong, Virginia, 1:42.64
7. Christian Ferraro, Georgia Tech, 1:43.03
8. Aaron Schultz, Notre Dame, 1:44.00

This morning’s prelims wrapped up with both Nicolas Albiero and Andreas Vazaiosflirting with the meet record of 1:41.42, jointly held by Vazaios and NC State alum Christian McCurdy.  The two were both about two-tenths of a second off of the record this morning, so look for this one to go down tonight.

Both men will have teammates in tonight’s A-final: Louisville’s Zach Harting qualified 4th with a time of 1:42.22, while NC State’s James Bretscher qualified 6th with a 1:42.61.

Virginia once again got a pair of swimmers into the top eight: Ted Schubert followed up his impressive 400 IM time trial last night with a 1:42.00 this morning, and Zach Fong will also join him after touching in 1:42.64.  We’ll crunch the numbers here in a bit, but right now, it’s looking like the Cavaliers stand a good chance of moving up from 5th to 3rd today in the team standings.

Georgia Tech’s Christian Ferraro (1:43.03) and Notre Dame’s Aaron Schultz (1:44.00) round out the top eight.