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Cal Signs World Championship Breaststroke Finalist Marina Garcia From Spain For Class of 2013

Teri McKeever, it appears, has proverbially responded to the criticisms over Cal’s need to bring in a big-name breaststroker to join the depth of talent that this Cal program has on the backstroke, butterfly, and freestyle legs.

McKeever confirmed to SwimSwam today that in April, Cal inked Spanish National Teamer, National Record holder, and European Championship medalist Marina Garcia Urzainqui.

Garcia has been 31.2, 1:07.0 and 2:22.2 in the long course breaststrokes, all earlier this year. Those times convert to 58-mid and 2:04-mid in yards, which are both significantly faster than Cal had last year and should put her immediately into the top 5 at NCAA’s.

She was also the bronze medalist at the 2012 European Long Course Championships in the 100, and at the 2012 European Short Course Championships took silver in the 200 and bronze in the 100, showing that she should make a solid transition to yards.

Next year, Cal’s medley relay looks something like this:

Backstroke: Missy Franklin (Olympic/World Champion in 100) or Liz Pelton (4th at Worlds in 100) or Rachel Bootsma (Olympian in 100) or two-time NCAA Champion Cindy Tran
Breaststroke: Marina Garcia (7th at Worlds in 100)
Butterfly: Farida Osman (7th at Worlds in 50 fly) or Rachel Bootsma
Freestyle: Kaylin Bing (18th in the NCA last year in the 50) or Rachael Acker (48.0 in the 100) or Kristen Vredeveld (one of the fastest high school sprinters in history) or Missy Franklin (4th at Worlds in the 100 meter free)

Scary, and Garcia’s addition really brings these medleys to a point. Cal now looks like the big favorites to win next season’s team NCAA Championship. The Cal medley relay, even if made up of just freshmen and sophomores, could legitimately medal at the World Championships

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cynthia curran
11 years ago

The Ivy League was in their prime in the 1960’s with Harvard and Yale. Actually, there swimmers are not that bad considering the Ivy league doesn’t support sports like they do in the South or Texas.

cynthia curran
11 years ago

SEC schools have somewhat of a weather advantage too.
Yeah, its not as nice it more humid but the east coast north is humid and cold, yikes. Coastal California nice just expensive

the dude
11 years ago

I think Garcia could swim 500 on the first day of NC’s. In season she’s been 4.15 lcm. She has very good aerobic backroung.

Ben
11 years ago

Wow, you really think Teri is responding to criticism over a backstroker? Really? She knows what she needs and wants;she hardly needs an outsider to point out her recruiting priorities.

liquidassets
11 years ago

Michigan, Stanford, and Cal have some natural advantages, especially among international recruits, because they have both internationally ranked academics and swimmers. The Cali schools including USC have some advantage because many swimmers stay in state, so that’s a very large recruiting pool, and then, many east coasters or from other areas come to “Try out California”, along with the great weather. SEC schools have somewhat of a weather advantage too.

I didn’t remember hearing much about Garcia prior to Worlds. Are her short course credentials equally impressive?

bobo gigi
Reply to  liquidassets
11 years ago

It looks like she’s more a long course swimmer and it’s good for her. But she also has references in short course. Her best SCM times are 1.05.82 in the 100 breast when she takes the bronze medal at the last European championships and 2.20.57 when she takes the silver medal at the same meet. And since last November she has improved a lot. 31.22 in the 50 breast, 1.07.08 in the 100 breast and 2.22.88 in the 200 breast in Barcelona this summer. She was at home. She was born in Barcelona. No reason she can’t swim 58 and 2.04 in SCY in her first season at Cal.

bobo gigi
Reply to  Braden Keith
11 years ago

I have written that just above. 🙂

KM
11 years ago

Serious questions for the college types. How does Cal (or any major player) land so much talent with so few scholarships? How many of these elite swimmers are on partial scholarships? And why do so many gather at one school when there’s a realistic possibility that they may not contribute ?

farmedswim
Reply to  KM
11 years ago

Assume you’re reffering to the women’s team? Is selecting the right school only about swimming and money? It appears Teri spreads fourteen scholarships around enough to attract the elite swimmers each year. If you thought about it, fourteen is a lot. In-state tuition is pretty low too. The remaining roster spots are the lower (relative) or mid level swimmers which are quite happy to swim for one of the world’s best schools.

1anda2
Reply to  KM
11 years ago

For sports that can give partial scholarships, the true limit on their scholarship amount is often dictated by institutional policy. Not to say that a particular institution can say “We’re giving 16 scholarships” when the NCAA limit is 14, but if particular institutions have a more lenient pathway for out of state students to obtain in state tuition rates they will be working with a bigger pie. School A may be able to offer an out of state swimmer 85% versus School B’s offer of 70%, but if school B can easily get that swimmer an in state tuition rate that 70% offer may present a smaller out of pocket expense and tip the scales. Obviously Cal has a large… Read more »

duckduckgoose
Reply to  KM
11 years ago

Schools without strong teams/tradition, strong academics, coaching, large in-state talent pools, decent facilities, or specific coaching expertise (sprints, distance, stroke, or diving) are forced to “overspend” on scholarships to compensate for factors more attractive schools possess. Somebody said last week that Harvard/Yale/Princeton would be top ten fixtures if they offered scholarships. Don’t think that all three would be top ten programs, but at least one would be.

Women’s basketball has 15 scholarships (vs 15 for men’s), but very few women’s powers ever use all 15 scholarships. During Natalie Coughlin’s tenure at Cal, Teri’s team wasn’t even fully funded with 14 scholarships. Depth wins dual meets and conference championships, but high-end depth wins NCAA team titles and that can be achieved… Read more »

SwimFan
Reply to  duckduckgoose
11 years ago

I disagree with your statement. Harvard and Princeton bring in top 10 and top 20 classes all the time and they do not place in those positions at NCAA’s. The disadvantage with the Ivies is training time. You can’t start until some time in October per the Ivy League and their departments probably do not care as much about national ranking – just whether one Ivy beats another.

swimmer24
Reply to  SwimFan
11 years ago

The high ranked classes are relatively new for Harvard and Princeton. The Ivy League got A LOT faster in the past 5-6 years, starting with much better classes. My theory behind this is that with the economic downturn, kids/parent began to put more emphasis on where their degree was coming from. Which would make the Ivies a lot more attractive.

Joel Lin
11 years ago

Game over is right.

THE BERKELEY DYNASTY.

Champ
11 years ago

Don’t forget about Cindy Tran. I’d say it’s going to be between her and Bootsma for the backstroke spot, Garcia on the breaststroke, either Bootsma, Osman or Tran on the fly leg and Missy anchoring.

This is also somewhat off topic but in regards to their distance swimmers, I could see Missy swimming the 500 on the first day of NCAA’s considering she went 4:34 this year

About Braden Keith

Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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