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The Minnesota Golden Gophers are defending home turf in the high school class of 2023, grabbing their second in-state commitment already with a verbal from Claire Reinke.
Reinke comes from Wayzata High School and the Hurricanes Swim Team in suburban Minneapolis, and joins a class that includes the top in-state swimmer in the high school class of 2023: Olympic Trials Wave I finalist Katie McCarthy.
The Gophers have struggled to recruit their home state in recent years, even in a metro that produces a ton of top D1 talent every season. Their 2021-2022 roster has only 9 Minnesotans among 33 athletes – and only have one announced commit from in state in the class of 2022
In Reinke, they pick up a butterflier who is a 2022 Summer juniors qualifier both in long course and short course yards. She also has a 2021 US Open cut in the 100 meter fly, where her best is 1:02.01.
Reinke is the defending Minnesota Class AA Champion in the 100 yard fly, swimming 54.36 in November after swimming her best time of 53.97 at a Sectional meet. She also won the 2019 title as a freshman. Her most recent title came after making her commitment in October.
Best Times in yards:
- 50 free – 23.97
- 100 free – 52.60
- 100 fly – 53.97
- 200 fly – 2:04.39
Her best time in the 100 fly is almost as fast already as Minnesota’s top performer this season Jordan McGinty, who swam 53.80 at the Minnesota Invite three weeks ago.
Reinke and McCarthy are the first two commitments for the Gophers in the class of 2023. Minnesota finished 6th at last year’s Big Ten Championship meet with 555 points. The butterflies were a weakness for them – they scored just 3 points in the 100 fly and 17 in the 200 fly.
The team placed 24th at the NCAA Championships, with all 40 of their diving points coming from Sarah Bacon, who won springboard events.
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On the Kelly subject:
Bo Becker. 2020 Tokyo. GOLD. 🙂
Congrats Claire! Wish you the best of luck in the future!
Congratulations! Go gophers! You will do great things!
Really feel like anyone with MN swimming knowledge knows that Kelly and Co. have been the main issue. Dennis’ worst is comparable with Kelly’s best (men). Women have also gone from perennial contenders to middle of the pack.
But ya, let’s blame the MN swimmers, club coaches, and parents as being the reason for U of MN not doing well.
At least on the men’s side, the recruiting is passive and apathetic.
Right on Former Big10. Kraemer was lucky to have Eva doing his recruiting for a while there. He had no interest.
So many poor decisions by the head coach… You fire Dennis 3 days after he coaches Toomey to the first Big 10 swimmer sub 19 seconds and its a bad look. Worse then, Ray shows everyone how dumb Kramer was and hires Dennis, which ends up being the missing piece as IU goes on to win the Big 10 and rises to where they are now. When Dennis took over Minnesota in the 80’s, they were dead last in the Big 10…. He took them to Big 10 Champions and Top 10 NCAA…. Kramer has taken the program full circle back to dead last now that Michigan State has dropped their program. It’s also no secret that Kramer;s personal life… Read more »
female prospects…
If it’s no secret, please expand upon Kramer’s personal life choices. I was recruited by him in the early 2000s and many of my club teammates swam for him. I never heard anything untoward about him. But I also understand that I interacted with him quite some time ago, and people can change.
If Minnesota kept in-state talent similar to other Big 10 schools, they would be a perennial powerhouse at NCAA’s MEN AND WOMEN!!!!!!! Poor club relationships around the Minneapolis metro and inability to identify talent from within the state is the root. Spend too much time recruiting average swimmers from the coasts.
I remember the good old days when the Minnesota women won Big Tens (4 in a row) and they would usually place in the top 20 at NCAAs but not any more. For the last few years the team has plummeted and I wondered why. I thought that perhaps it was all the unpleasantness going on in the Minneapolis area back in 2020 that made people think twice about coming to Minnesota. Here’s hoping that things can be turned around. This young lady seems like a promising recruit
Absolutely nothing to do with the Minneapolis area. Kraemer and crew have had no interest in local talent. They should. There have been great swimmers ending up at other schools for a while now . Goes back at least to Kira Zubar who they showed zero interest in. They reap what they sow.
how do you know they have no interest?
Read swimmergod.
I probably have way more insight that he does, he is just trolling
It’s tough cause a lot of MN kids dream of going out of state and aren’t really 4 season kinda people. But agree plenty of talent in the state to make a nationally competitive team.
This couldn’t be more true, particularly on the men’s side. JT Larson, Peter Larson, Jack Dahlgren, Hayden Zhang, Will Whittington. All top tier recruits out of MN the past five years or so, and none went to MN.
The coaching staff can’t seem to give these kids a good enough value proposition to choose in state. Personal opinion is that a lot of that has to do with the coaching staffs concentration around distance events, but I think the recent hire of Heidi Busack could help with that. Time will tell.
In General I agree with your comment up to the point of the focus being on Distance events…Max M and Bowe Becker have been their top performing swimmers recently.
Their coaching staff should be visible at club practices around the area – ESPECIALLY on Kate Lundsten’s pool deck!
That’s a fair point.
Bowe and Max were standouts. But the depth of sprinting just isn’t there. Look at their free relays over the past several year. If you want to be a successful college team that wins meets, you need several guys that can drop a solid 50/100.
Or ya know… any one of the amazing clubs within a 40 minute drive— Edina, Tonka, Riptide, St. Croix…
And to a lesser degree- Blackline, Storm, etc…
As a former club coach, in the area, I had no issues telling my recruited swimmers which schools to stay away from, and which schools were worth their time.
It’s what we’re supposed to do, as coaches-look out for our swimmers.
Doesn’t take too much brain power to see who is on the up— NU, Nebraska, WISCO, PSU seems to be going in a better direction, Ohio State has really stepped up and become a perennial top 3…
And who has been down for the better part of a decade,… Read more »
Heidi is a MN legend, but idk what her X factor, as a coach, is that will change the program…
I thought her name is Stacy
Lol, dang it. Good catch 🙃
it’s not up to the swim coaches to magically keep Regan Smith from going to Stanford. E.g. they can’t control the weather, they have a limited budget, kids want to explore, etc. Just watch out for this Big10 and NCAA
A collegiate program still has the ability to create club relationships throughout their area and show a presence while kids are in the age group level. The University of Minnesota has a situation unlike almost any other major program in where there is no other D1 programs in a 250 mile radius (except for the recent addition of St Thomas as of last year).
St. Thomas will be out performing the U within 10 years, I have no doubts. Nicer campus, better area, and an athletics department that actually cares.
100% agree. UST has great potential
You are missing the point.
thanks for you 0 arguments and 00 knowledge on the subject
What? You don’t like giving a 1:41/4:36/9:30guy from Mission Viejo 60%!?!?