2020 BULLDOG INVITATIONAL
- February 29-March 1, 2020
- Athens, GA
- Short Course Yards
- Estimated NCAA Invite Times
- NCAA ‘A’ Cuts
- Results
Following the SEC Championships last week, Georgia hosted their 2020 Bulldog Invitational as a last chance meet to qualify for the NCAA Championships.
SEC Champion Courtney Harnish of Georgia put up a few best times. In the 200 back prelims, Harnish broke 1:54 for the first time in 1:53.68. In finals, she went after the first 100 and then cruised through the back half, while teammate Maddie Homovich won the final in a season-best 1:53.95. Homovich is now ranked 38th in the 200 back this season. Harnish also dropped a tenth in the 50 free. She clipped her best from midseason in the 100 fly, posting a 52.39 in prelims.
Hawaii’s Lucia Lassman had a big swim, knocking 4 tenths off her best to win the 100 fly final in 52.06. That moves her up to 25th in the nation and should safely qualify her for NCAAs. In the men’s 100 breast, Hawaii’s Olli Kokko swam a lifetime best 51.71 from the B final. He should be safely qualified for NCAAs, as he’s now the 9th fastest man in the NCAA this season.
Teammate Kane Follows matched his seed time with a 1:41.51 in the 200 back. That ranks him 26th with one major conference meet, the Pac-12 Championships, remaining. Moving ahead of him, however, was Auburn’s Lleyton Smith, now the #25 swimmer after dropping a second with his 1:41.49 in prelims.
OTHER IMPACT SWIMS
- Florida State’s Nina Kucheran broke 1:00 for the first time this season in the 100 breast. She posted a 59.93 to move up to 36th in the nation. She split a 27.20 on the 200 medley relay as FSU just missed the ‘A’ cut in 1:36.84.
- South Carolina’s Phil Costin matched his season-best 1:34.28 in the 200 free and remains ranked 40th.
- Alabama’s Kalia Antoniou moved up to #31 with her 22.11 in the 50 free. Teammate Colton Stogner dropped a lifetime best 19.57 in the men’s race, but that ranks him outside of the top 40.
It is not fair that the later conference swimmers cannot take an extra week and compete in a time trial like the earlier conference people are doing. This puts the later conference kids at a huge disadvantage.. they are essentially being deprived of a last chance by virtue of scheduling. The conference times for each school should be the final attempt at qualification. Ridiculous that this practice continues. I feel sorry for the ‘bubble’ kids that are being bumped by this unfair practice.
The Pac-12 has a last chance meet on Sunday after the meet. And that’s not how NCAA qualifying works. You don’t qualify based just on your time at conference. It’s the fastest swimmers throughout the entire season. If you swim fast enough, you make it. If you don’t make the cut line, you don’t. And that makes sense. Say someone had an accident like Abbey Weitzeil had injured her arm, but did it on a relay the first night instead of in the 50 free and couldn’t swim individually at all. Or a swimmer gets sick, has a family emergency, etc. They can’t swim at conference, even though they’re fully prepared to swim fast. They’re one of the best swimmers… Read more »
Yes, that is exactly what the rule should be. Like the olympics… no excuses for family emergencies, sickness, etc. Also, like the Olympic trials. One meet one shot. The current system is inequitable and should be changed.
This isn’t the Olympics. It’s NCAAs. That’s super unnecessary. Please stop spamming articles with these comment over and over.
“The current system is inequitable”
Everyone gets the same number of meets to qualify in. That is not “inequitable” at all.
I don’t think it’s inequitable, unfair, or any of the above.
I just think it’s boring, and sucks the importance out of conference championship meets, which so many teams already work so hard to downplay the significance of. I’d rather see everyone have to roll the dice at their conference meets rather than have this backup plan available.
I can agree with that. I do think the last chance meets get a bit ridiculous, looking at results and sometimes somebody has swam 2 50 frees, a time trial, a 100 going out for the 50, and a leadoff on a 200 free relay.
Hawaii seem to do this last change meet qualifying thing often. I wonder if they stay on the mainland between conference and last chance meet and that gives the swimmers another week to adjust to jet lag?
They don’t
The results don’t have relay take off numbers. I thought all time trials had to have video and working relay pads?
I heard there was a fight over who would be using the old Liberty timing system
So if Harnish is ahead of her Maddie but Harnish probably doesn’t swim it so that leaves Maddie at 37th with no other scratches?
That would be correct. Have to figure there will be a couple more scratches above, as well. Paige Madden of Virginia and Kylee Alons of NC State both rank above Homovich with times from mid-season meets, then did not compete in the 200 back at ACCs (Madden instead swimming an incredible 15:50 1650 on the final day, and Alons swimming a 47.7 100 free, both of which seed to score highly at NCAAs).
Harnish looks like she split about the same at the 100 in the finals (55) but just really dropped off in the second half. Did something happen?
Most of the already-qualified UGA swimmers didn’t swim finals at all. Maybe she was just there to pace Homovich through the front half.
I’m not sure if this is the reasoning, but I love this idea of pacing teammates to help them push toward stronger times. You see it in track all the time, where runners attempting to attain cuts or records will have one or more pacers helping them stay on track through the beginning stages of the race. A great show of camaraderie, in my opinion.