There are age groupers, college kids, and pros mixed in to the 2017 U.S. Worlds Team, which is 45 swimmers (pool and open water, combined) strong. The swimming scene in the USA is dominated by the NCAA collegiate system, which typically acts as a feeder for the national team and eventual professional careers. We’ve compiled a breakdown of college affiliations from all of the swimmers on the U.S. team for Budapest, based on where they’re committed to swim, where they currently go to school or where they most recently competed as an undergrad.
In terms of conference, the SEC reigns supreme with 19 swimmers. The Pac-12 has 13 swimmers affiliated, while the Big Ten and ACC have 7 each. Texas is the sole representative for the Big 12 conference with 4 swimmers
NOTE: Open Water swimmers have been included in this breakdown. Their names are followed by an ‘OW’ to distinguish them from the pool swimmers.
HEAVY HITTERS
These are the teams with at least four swimmers headed to Budapest for the USA. Coaches from all of these schools are on the Worlds coaching staff, with Cal’s Dave Durden (men’s head coach) and Stanford‘s Greg Meehan (women’s head coach) taking leading roles.
The winners of overall bragging rights, with a landslide victory, goes to the University of Georgia. They have seven alums, one current swimmer (Jay Litherland) and one class of 2022 commit (Dakota Luther) going to Worlds this summer. As expected UGA head coach Jack Bauerle was named to the 2017 Worlds coaching staff.
GEORGIA (9)
- Hali Flickinger
- Dakota Luther
- Melanie Margalis
- Olivia Smoliga
- Pace Clark
- Nic Fink
- Andrew Gemmell (OW)
- Chase Kalisz
- Jay Litherland
CAL (5)
- Kathleen Baker
- Abbey Weitzeil
- Nathan Adrian
- Ryan Murphy
- Jacob Pebley
STANFORD (5)
- Katie Ledecky
- Simone Manuel
- Lia Neal
- Abrahm Devine
- True Sweetser
TEXAS (4)
- Madisyn Cox
- Jack Conger
- Townley Haas
- Clark Smith
SMALLER GROUPINGS
These schools have two or three swimmers each going to Worlds. Some of them, like Florida, have swimmers who aren’t connected by age (Dressel is 20, Beisel 24, and Dwyer 28). Florida is a perennial powerhouse, though, so it makes sense to have swimmers from various different years representing. Other schools, like Texas A&M, have swimmers like Bethany Galat and Sarah Gibson who are current training partners.
Arthur Albiero (Louisville), Gregg Troy (Florida) and Ray Looze (Indiana) are on the 2017 Worlds coaching staff.
INDIANA (3)
- Lilly King
- Cody Miller
- Blake Pieroni
FLORIDA (3)
- Elizabeth Beisel
- Caeleb Dressel
- Conor Dwyer
AUBURN (2)
- Zach Apple
- Zane Grothe
LOUISVILLE (2)
- Mallory Comerford
- Kelsi Worrell
MIZZOU (2)
- Hannah Stevens
- Michael Chadwick
NORTHWESTERN (2)
- Matt Grevers
- Jordan Wilimovsky (OW)
TEXAS A&M (2)
- Bethany Galat
- Sarah Gibson
USC (2)
- Haley Anderson (OW)
- Becca Mann (OW)
VIRGINIA (2)
- Leah Smith
- Brendan Casey (OW)
SOLO DOLO
This isn’t a knock on any of the following programs– they just are being represented by a sole swimmer in Budapest. Pros like Katie Meili aren’t typically paired with their alma maters when their names come to mind, but she did swim and complete her undergrad degrees at Columbia.
ARIZONA
- Kevin Cordes
COLUMBIA
DUKE
- Ashley Twichell (OW)
NC STATE
- Justin Ress
OHIO STATE
- Tim Phillips
TENNESSEE
- David Heron (OW)
UNC
- Chip Peterson (OW)
WISCONSIN
- Cierra Runge
UNATTACHED
These young stars are still in high school and have not committed to any NCAA programs (that we know of).
- Cathryn Salladin (OW)
- Regan Smith
- Robert Finke
- Simon Lamar (OW)
Think it would be helpful to show either the coach’s name for each swimmer or a breakout by gender. Some of these are not combined programs with the same coach for men and women.
Thought it would be interesting to mention that Olivia Anderson, who is going to UGA next year, will be representing Canada at Worlds. Mackenzie Paddington (starting at Minnesota in the fall) and Kierra Smith (just graduated from Minnesota) will be as well.
Javi is also UGA. UGA should recruit from HPCO and they will have unstoppable women…
Other NCAA Canadians in Budapest Bagshaw (Cal), Funk (michigan), McGregor/Pickrem (A&M), Nicol (SMU), Siwicki (minnesota), Toro (ohio state) and Wilby (head coach….Florida)
Kennedy Goss – Canada swims Indiana I believe Indiana has several others swimming for other countries I’d love to see that list.
I believe that these Hoosiers have qualified:
Anze Tavcar- Slovenia
Marwan ElKamash- Egypt
Ali Khalafalla- Egypt
Mohamed (Misho) Samy- Egypt (I think he qualified, but I may be wrong; he’s been home most of the summer.)
Kennedy Goss- Canada, just missed WC with some high-placing finishes at Trials, but IS going to WUGS.
Vini Lanza- Brazil, just missed WC, but will possibly be selected for WUGS.
While not a topic of this article, IU is also sending 2 divers to Budapest. Mikey Hixon and Jess Parratto each made the team in the 3m and 10m, respectively, both individual and synchro, with Sam Dorman (U. Miami) and Tarrin Gilliland (high school) resp. as partners. Mikey will also dive 1m individual.
you should list all who made the 3 teams this summer; where they are going to school and who is coached by them
Not strictly relevant, but…
1. I was astonished to see Beisel is only 24. I thought it must have been a typo. I guess when you’re the youngest to make an Olympic team you can make a lot of national teams and still be young.
2. Same for Chip Peterson. He was the big thing in OW in 2005 and has had a little bit less success in the last 7 years. It was weird to realize first that he’s still competing, and secondly that he’s only 29.
Isn’t Simon Lamar committed to Stanford?
He says that he isn’t.
Isn’t yet? Or not at all? Isn’t there is an article on SwimSwam a few days ago on his commitment to Stanford?
ADSF – There was a SwimSwam article by Anne Lepesant dated July 5, 2017 saying he committed. (http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https://staging.swimswam.com/junior-worlds-bronze-medalist-simon-lamar-verbally-commits-stanford/) It appears to have been renamed/deleted/moved, or something. Braden wrote in his comment “He says…”. So it would appear that was fact-checked. Going along with the whole ‘bragging rights’ aspect from the intro, bragging rights would only belong to the team that got him on to the Worlds team, FAST (Fullerton, CA). Also, even if he had committed, there’s no way to predict if he would actually enroll, attend, compete for, and graduate from Stanford.
If you want to have a great NCAA and a U.S.i international team career, you’d be stupid not to consider Georgia. They have it dialed in.
Unless you are a sprint freestyler, aside from that, arguably the current best producing college.
Is Olivia Smoliga not a sprinter?
Exactly. I wouldn’t peg Georgia as a bad place for sprinters. We should’ve learned by now from the Troy-can’t-coach-sprinters outcry when Dressel went there.
Academically, Stanford & Cal are much better choices for your life after swimming thou.
On average, sure. So are the Ivy’s. But in the last 20 years, Georgia has produced 9 Rhodes Scholars, 5 Gates Cambridge Scholars, 6 Marshall Scholars, 3 Mitchell Scholars, 51 Goldwater Scholars, 13 Truman Scholars, 13 Udall Scholars and 36 Boren Scholars. 112 UGA students were offered Fulbright Scholarships in the past 15 years. It’s one of the top producers of U.S. Fulbright students by type of institution. If you’re smart and hardworking, there will be loads of opportunities after graduation.
^exactly. Cal and Stanford are without a doubt excellent schools. But if you’re smart and hardworking you can get a good education and succeed whereever you go. Especially a large-state university with lots of resources such as Georgia.
Summer reading assignment for you. Malcolm Gladwell and Frank Bruni.
Forgot to mention Kara Lynn Joyce, Maritza Correia, Amanda Weir, Allison Schmitt, Morgan Romano, Shannon Vreeland, Chantal Van Landhegam…
Don’t see too many guys on that “sprint list”
Should be placing higher at NCaas on the mens side. They do not because they put more emphasis on the 500 free and 400Im than the relays which are worth double and reward those with the most talent on their team…
womens team… greatness
Shouldn’t Taylor Abbott from Tennessee (and Coach Tyler Fenwick) be on this list?
Aquatics – as far as we know, Taylor Abbott is going to the World University Games rather than the World Championships. This list is for the World Championships.
Grevers is AZ, just like Grothe is now Indiana.