Overreacting To Night One Of The 2024 NCAA Women’s DI Swimming And Diving Championships

We’re back with our usual segment of overreactions, this time from the 2024 NCAA Division I Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships. You know the drill: we’ll jump to massive conclusions based on one night of racing!

Gretchen Walsh Can Start For The Virginia Men’s Basketball Team

I only watched ten minutes of Virginia’s 67-42 loss to Colorado State in the First Four of the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament on Tuesday night, but ten minutes was enough for me to know that UVA was struggling. But before Virginia fans go into despair over their basketball team’s misfortunes, I propose a grand solution: get Gretchen Walsh in a uniform.

Walsh is far and away the most dominant athlete on Virginia’s campus right now. On Wednesday, she broke yet another NCAA record (it’s part of her weekly routine!) — leading off Virginia’s 200 medley relay with a time of 22.10, smashing Maggie MacNeil’s previous record by 0.42 seconds. I don’t want to hear anything about how Walsh is a female swimmer with no basketball experience. She’s superhuman, is over six foot, can break records like crazy, and would probably be able to dunk if she tried (isn’t going 19 in the 50 free the swimming equivalent of dunking?). And I’m sure she would be able to shoot better than 25% from the field, which is what UVA men’s basketball shot from on Tuesday night.

After all, SwimSwam editor-in-chief Braden Keith did say that Walsh was “going Caitlin Clark” during the ACC Championships (whatever that means…).

I’m sure Todd DeSorbo doesn’t want to give up his star swimmer, but I’m sure he can figure something out with Tony Bennett and make it work. But whatever they end up doing, all I’m saying is that I expect to see Walsh on the floor in the John Paul Jones Arena next winter.

(By the way, SwimSwam’s March Madness bracket challenges are still open, so please join!)

NC State Needs To Go To Relay Camp

For the second year in a row, the NC State women have DQed in a relay due to an early takeoff, and it could cost them a few places in the final rankings. Last year, they were DQed for the same reason in the 200 free relay, and it was the difference between winning a trophy and going home in fifth place without one.

• For a more serious breakdown of NC State’s DQ, click here.

Clearly, after two consecutive years of being DQed, this is a chronic NC State problem (and let’s ignore every single other relay where NC State did everything legally). The only solution here would be to pull what USA Swimming did and host a private relay camp in Raleigh — no media allowed, of course. It worked for Team USA last year (did it?), so why not try it out for a college team?

The Wolfpack women could spend three days doing absolutely nothing but relay exchanges. Heck, to make it more interesting, they could also invite Great Britain’s men’s 400 free relay because they likely need help in that department as well. It will all be worth it in the end, because anything for those relay points!

NC State has a chance to prove itself on Thursday in the 200 free relay, where it has a shot at redemption for its misfortunes both on Wednesday and last year. Maybe in that 200 free relay, we’ll see a legit 20.3 split from Katharine Berkoff…

Amy Tang Does Not Need a Relay Camp

Amy Tang has not been a best time in the 50 yard free (flat start) since December 2019, when she was still in high school and went 22.06 at Winter Juniors – West.

But she’s had some really-fast relay splits, and did so again on Wednesday to anchor Stanford’s 8th-place 200 medley relay with a 21.23.

Could her four-year drought be over? Stanford really needs it to be.

The junior is catching a wave of success for the Cardinal, even as their varsity team has been neutered of its superstars either via going pro (Regan Smith), redshirting (Torri Huske), or transferring (Claire Curzan), but while the names aren’t as big, the program is going back to roots and proving that it can develop swimmers. This could be the start of a new upswing for Greg Meehan and the Stanford women.

Is Virginia’s Reign Over???

For the first time since 2022, the Virginia women have *not* won a relay at an NCAA Championship meet. In fact, they finished fourth, marking their first time missing a relay podium since 2019 — well before their reign over the NCAA started.

Clearly, the sky is falling for Todd Desorbo and his crew. What went from for the Cavaliers, though? Did they gamble too much when they left Gretchen Walsh off the relay (after all, UVA’s time from ACCs was two seconds faster than Florida’s time)? Was it Alex Walsh and Reilly Tiltmann swimming slower splits than last year? Did the aforementioned postseason struggles of Virginia basketball hit the swim team as well? Or did Florida, Tennessee, and Stanford simply just do good?

For the first time in this article, I’ll be rational here. Yes, there will be debate about the utilization of Gretchen Walsh, and whether it would have been better to leave her off another relay instead. But in the long run, this result probably won’t affect how UVA will fare at the end of the meet. It is in a comfortable position to four-peat for a title, and one fourth-place finish won’t change that. But since everyone loves jumping to conclusions, I’m prepared to hear “washed” jokes all night.

That being said, this relay was monumental for the Florida women — their first relay win since 2010. Bella Sims and Isabel Ivey were great as expected, but it was Emma Weyant and Micayla Cronk who stepped up big time on the back half, splitting career-best times of 1:42.90 and 1:43.02 respectively. The Gators won’t be going away anytime soon, as they are projected to finish third in this meet and started things off with this statement win. Stanford and Tennessee did very well too, with both teams dropping significantly from their seed times.

Tennessee Taper Jokes Are Getting Old, But The USC Curse Remains

For years, Tennessee was the butt of taper jokes, as the Volunteers historically have added significant time from SECs over to NCAAs. Last season, the women’s team combated the notion that they couldn’t perform at NCAAs, finishing with 2.5 more points than projected. However, that wasn’t enough for naysayers to question whether they’d win a trophy and place fourth as projected this year.

On the first day of this year’s NCAAs, Tennessee finished in the top five for both the 200 medley and 800 free relay, improving from their seed in both events and ending day one in third place. Freshman Camille Spink has been phenomenal thus far (as she’s been all season), leading the team with a 1:42.08 split in the 800 free relay. It’s only been one night, but clearly Matt Kredich knows what he’s doing. Therefore, I propose that we put the “Tennessee Taper” jokes to rest. Actually, that’s too soft. We should burn that saying, or blow it up into smithereens.

Meanwhile, USC, another team known to underperform at NCAAs, continues that trend. The Trojans were one of the hottest rising teams this season and were lights-out at midseasons, but seemed to have stalled a bit at NCAAs. They added 0.74 seconds in the 200 medley relay and nearly three seconds in the 800 free relay, going from the fifth overall seed to finishing in 11th for the latter relay. It seemed like this season, USC was finally ready to prove the doubters wrong, but as of now, those doubters are right. However, this team still has three more days to tell us otherwise.