3-Time Florida High School State Champion Olivia Peoples Commits to Gators

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Florida High School State Champion Olivia Peoples has verbally committed to the University of Florida as part of its class of 2021. The high school junior attends Nease High School in Ponte Vedra, Florida and trains with the Bolles School Sharks – the club arm of the famed Bolles School program.

Peoples, who is still only 16-years old, is a 3-time Florida High School State Champion. As a freshman and sophomore, she won the 100 breaststroke at the 3A State Meet, which is the second-largest group of public schools based on enrollment in Florida. As a junior, Nease moved up to Class 4A, for the state’s biggest schools, and Peoples won the 100 fly title (53.15) and finished 2nd in the 100 breaststroke (1:02.65).

A rare combination of talents in the 100 fly and 100 breast, her best times in both races actually came in the 2019 4A State Championship preliminary round – where she swam 52.73 in the 100 fly to break the State Record and 1:01.94 in the 100 breast. She also split 28.19 in the 50 breaststroke as part of her team’s prelims 200 medley relay (again, faster than finals), and led off the school’s 200 free relay in 23.62 in prelims (she didn’t swim finals of that relay).

Best Times in Yards:

• 50 free – 23.55
• 100 free – 51.74
• 200 free – 1:53.59
• 100 back – 59.87 (in 2016 at age 13)
• 100 breast – 1:01.94
• 200 breast – 2:15.26
• 100 fly – 52.73
• 200 fly – 2:10.97 (in 2016 at age 13)
• 200 IM – 2:03.17
• 400 IM – 4:32.26 (in 2018 at age 14)

Florida needs help in both events. Last year, they had no woman ranked in the top 10 of the SEC in either the 100 breast or 100 fly. The Gators are already racking up a big haul in the class of 2021 – they have verbal commitments from the #8 recruit in the class Brooke Zettel (53.7 fly/1:57.9 & 4:13.3 IMer); the #17 recruit Micayla Cronk (22.9/48.2/1:44.3 freestyler); National Junior Teamer Anna Auld (4:48.1/16:34.6 freestyler); Georgia Bates (55.6 fly/56.7 backstroker); and Mary Kate Kelley (54.3/1:58.6 backstroker).

The Gators bring in a solid butterflier in Kenady Beil (53.7) in the class of 2020, and a pair of good breaststrokers in Cecilia Porter (1:00.5) and Carly Schwab (1:01.7) in the class of 2020 as well, but nobody in either class is as good in the 100 fly as Peoples is yet, and certainly nobody has that combination of abilities that Peoples does. Her best time in the 100 fly would have qualified her for the B Final at last year’s SEC Championship meet.

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