Michigan’s Richard Funk, with an NCAA Automatic Qualifying mark last weekend at the SMU Classic in the 100 yard breaststroke, has been named the conference’s Swimmer of the Week.
The junior from Canada had a whale of a weekend, winning that 100 breast with a 52.31: a time that is just half-a-second shy of his career best, and moves him to 2nd in the country so far this year.
Funk was also a part of Michigan’s 400 medley relay, that was a 3:07.76 for another automatic qualifying mark, and broke Perkins Natatorium Pool Records in the 100 breast in 200 medley.
This is the third time in his career that Funk has been named the Big Ten Swimmer of the Week, and a 4th-straight win for the Michigan men overall (excluding Dec. 24th, where the conference only named a Diver of the Week).
Indiana’s Darian Schmidt won his 6th-career Diver of the Week honor, after winning the 3-meter and 1-meter events as Indiana toppled Iowa and Missouri. Schmidt, who is a springboard specialist, has been on fire in the 2013-2014 season coming off of a year when he placed in the top 6 on the two boards at NCAA’s.
The 3rd men’s award given out by the conference went to Indiana’s Anze Tavcar, who has been a surprising breakout for the Hoosiers this season. He won the 50 free (20.18), the 100 free (44.21) and was on the winning 400 free relay (2:59.34) in the team’s wins over Iowa and Missouri. This is the first time since the 2011-2012 season that Indiana has won the Freshman of the Week award, showing the improvements and blossoming of a gem-in-the-rough freshman class.
Blanco had a great meet, but he got MVP because he was in 4 A-finals, and therefore scored a lot of points. If he swam for Florida, USC, or Michigan, they would not have put him in 4 A-finals because they have faster swimmers in many events.
Interesting. Guermo Blanco from Purdue was named swimmer of the meet at the SMU Classic where Funk also participated but Funk gets Big 10 swimmer of the week?