2020 BIG 12 SWIMMING & DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS
- When: Wednesday, February 26th to Saturday, February 29th | Prelims 10:00 am | Finals 6:00 pm
- Where: Aquatic Center at Mylan Park, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV (Eastern Time Zone)
- Defending Champion: University of Texas Men (40x), University of Texas Women (8x)
- Live Results: Here
- Streaming: Here
- Championship Central: Here
- Detailed Timeline: Here
- Psych Sheets: Here
- Live Results: Here
The 2020 Big 12 Swimming & Diving Championships starts today in Morgantown, WV. Both Texas Longhorns teams are expected to win, but the lack of drama in the team races doesn’t preclude us seeing some fast swimming. Tonight’s session will feature the 200 medleys, the 800 medley relays, and men’s 1m diving.
Women’s 200 Medley Relay
- Texas – 1:36.72
- Kansas – 1:37.70
- Texas Christian- 1:40.06
The Longhorns shaved a bit of time off of their time trial from earlier today, hitting 1:37.72. The front half showed the most improvement. Claire Adams hit 23.84 tonight on the leadoff after going 24.03 earlier today. The Longhorns subbed in Evie Pfeifer on breast, whose 27.54 matched her 27.55 from midseason, and was a couple tenths faster than Kennedy Lohman’s 27.73 from the time trial. Kelly Pash (23.10) and Julia Cook (22.24) each were within a tenth of a second of this morning’s times.
Kansas took 2nd in 1:37.70, with a 27.15 breast split by Kate Steward highlighting that relay. TCU anchor Anna Munster split 22.05 to run down Iowa State and take 3rd in 1:40.06.
Men’s 200 Medley Relay
- Texas – 1:23.56
- West Virginia – 1:25.59
- Texas Christian – 1:28.93
The Longhorns almost perfectly matched their 1:23.53 from the Minnesota Invite with strong splits all around. Chris Staka led off in 21.13, Caspar Corbeau hit 23.74 on the breast leg, Maxime Rooney dipped under 20 to hit 19.83 on the fly leg, and Daniel Krueger anchored in 18.86. While the psych sheets didn’t seem to reflect any conference/meet records set in the last few years, that does actually appear to be a new Big 12 meet record, eclipsing (if live results are accurate), eclipsing a mark of 1:24.23 from way back in 2009.
The Longhorns’ ‘B’ and ‘C’ teams actually finished ahead of the other two schools, touching in 1:24.25 and 1:25.07, respectively. On the ‘B’ relay, Charlie Scheinfeld matched Corbeau with a 23.77 breast split, while Alvin Jiang was also under 20 with a 19.99 fly leg. Showing just how far Texas breaststroke has come in two years, Jake Foster hit 23.89 on the ‘C’ relay.
West Virginia officially took 2nd in 1:25.59. Angelo Russo led off in 21.79, Fausto Huerta split 23.95 on breast, David Dixon went 20.76 on fly, and Hunter Armstrong anchored in 19.09. TCU took 3rd in 1:28.93.
Men’s 1m Diving
- Grayson Campbell (Texas) – 422.45
- Jordan Windle (Texas) – 391.20
- Andrew Gawin-Parigini – 337.34
The Longhorns swept the top four spots, led by senior Grayson Campbell, who finished 7th in this event at last year’s NCAA championships.
Women’s 800 Free Relay
- Texas – 6:59.69
- Kansas – 7:14.12
- Texas Christian – 7:22.24
The Texas women won by over 14 seconds, although they were a little more than two seconds slower than their 6:57.04 from the Minnesota Invite, a time that currently has them ranked 6th in the nation. This relay consisted of the same four women who swum the 200 medley relay rough an hour earlier. Pash led off tonight in 1:44.834, then Cook (1:45.14), Adams (1:44.53), and Pfeifer (1:45.19) combined for a 6:59.69.
Kansas took 2nd in 7:14.12, with Jenny Nusbaum‘s 1:47.24 leadoff holding up as the fastest time among any of the four Kansas swimmers. TCU took 3rd in 7:22.24, as Sally Clough and Lucia Simovicova went 1:49.57 and 1:49.52 on the leadoff and 2nd legs, respectively.
Men’s 800 Free Relay
- Texas – 6:16.56
- Texas Christian – 6:26.23
- West Virginia – 6:35.20
The Texas men were nearly eight seconds off their nation-leading 8:08.40 from December, cruising to a 6:16.56 victory. Sam Pomajevich led off in 1:35.02, followed by Maxime Rooney (1:33.19), Austin Katz (1:34.18), and Drew Kibler (1:34.18). That’s probably the same lineup we’ll see at NCAAs next month, but with all four men safely qualified for NCAAs and the Big 12 title safely in the bag, chances are that none of the four are particularly tapered.
Naturally, the Longhorns’ ‘B’ relay actually touched 2nd, with a time of 6:21.94. TCU officially finished 2nd in 6:26.23, as Dusan Babic and Piotr Sadlowski put up nearly identical 1:35.9 splits in the middle of the field. West Virginia took 3rd with a 6:35.20, led by Armstrong’s 1:36.98.
Scores After Day 1
Women
- Texas – 80
- Kansas – 68
- TCU – 64
- Iowa State / West Virginia – 58
- (tie)
Men
- Texas – 148
- West Virginia – 132
- Texas Christian – 72
I miss John Superman Murray and his breaststroke splits.
Texas doesn’t usually fully taper for this meet, do they?
I always look forward to the Big 3 Swimming Championships. Always a riveting team race on the men’s side.
Texas’ men’s relay clearly indicates they don’t care about that meet. Like each year. Logically. What’s the use of tapering and peaking at a conference meet if then you underperform at NCAAs? Keep the best for when it counts.
Two points: (1) in the U.S., the biggest prize (Olympics) requires two tapers in a fairly rapid turn around. So why not get that mindset. (2) sometimes you have to swim fast to swim faster.
Hope the Texas women leave some for the big show… based off these results & their season thus far, they might have their best NCAAs yet!
Anyone else notice that Texas’ men’s B medley only missed the meet record by 0.02?
How is Texas still part of that conference?! They are gonna smash the rest of the teams like always, #unfair
Do you think swimming has ANYTHING to do with conference alignment? That’s 90% football, 9% basketball and 1% Olympic sports.
1% is way too high as an estimate of importance.
Regardless of how UT does in the major sports, the BigXII would be absolutely lost without them. Not a single major market outside of Texas, while the budget for UT is probably more than several others’ combined.
While I agree with your overall point, Texas being the only major television market depends on how you define “major.” West Virginia is in the Pittsburgh television market (24th biggest), and Kansas is in the Kansas City market (32nd biggest).
Without Texas, it’s definitely the weakest of the Power 5 market groups, but it’s not a total ghost town.
From TCU and WV point of vew, it is good to have Texas in the conference. You always want to compete against the best. European basketballl would never been as good as it is now without USA starting to send best players to international competition, and without best European players starting to come to NBA.
When was the last time a school had the same squad for the 200 medley relay and 800 free relay? That’s insane.