The Indiana men had an exceptional season, finishing 3rd overall at NCAAs, even challenging for the lead at certain points. While they performed well among the other teams at the Championships, perhaps more impressive was the way they performed against themselves and their record books.
There are 18 swimming events in the current college schedule, 13 individual and 5 relays. Of those 18 records, the Indiana men broke 11 of them, 10 came from the NCAA Championships alone.
In total, this comes out to 66% of their current team record book being set this year.
While it would be quicker to name the seven swimming team records they did not break, let’s start with the record they broke this season, but didn’t rebreak at NCAAs.
At the Big Ten Championships, Owen McDonald broke the team and Big Ten records in the men’s 200 backstroke, swimming 1:37.15 to win the event. This was not only a new Big Ten record, but it was also under the former 200 backstroke record of 1:38.18 which was set by Brendan Burns in 2024. McDonald swam the event again at NCAAs, but his finals time of 1:37.59 was not enough to rebreak his record.
Onto the 10 records the Hoosiers set at the NCAA Championships.
On the very first night of the meet, the Indiana 200 medley relay broke the American record and the team record in the men’s 200 medley relay. The team of Luke Barr (20.65), Brian Benzing (22.65), Finn Brooks (19.49), and Matt King (18.13) finished 5th in 1:20.92, breaking the 2023 team record of 1:21.52 from 2023 set by Brendan Burns (20.60), Van Mathias (22.53), Tomer Frankel (29.56), and Gavin Wight (18.83)
Day two saw even more team records with every single event being a new record. They started the day with a new record in the men’s 500, courtesy of Zalan Sarkany’s 4:09.22. The previous 500 freestyle record was set by Marwan Eklamash at 4:10.87 back in 2017.
In the other two individual events Owen McDonald broke the 200 IM record, swimming 1:39.42 to break Vini Lanza’s 2017 record of 1:40.23, and Finn Brooks swam 18.86 in the 50 prelims, three-hundredths faster than Van Mathias’ 18.89 record from 2023.
The final event of the day was the 200 freestyle relay, where the team of Finn Brooks (19.06), Matt King (18.42), Mikkel Lee (18.65), and Dylan Smiley (18.54) went 1:14.67 to rebreak their own record of 1:15.33 from Big Tens. The previous record was 1:15.41 set by Zach Apple (19.06), Bruno Blaskovic (18.78), Mohamed Samy (18.87), and Brandon Hamblin (18.70) in 2019.
Only one record “fell” on Friday, and it was the men’s 400 IM. Zalan Sarkany didn’t actually break the team record, but he did tie it, so we are counting it. He went 3:40.64 in the 400 IM finals to finish just one spot out of finals at 17th. His time was exactly the same as the Indiana record set in 2014 by Stephen Schmuhl.
Sarkany broke his 3rd and final record on Saturday with his 1650 freestyle win where he went 14:21.29. This made him the 3rd fastest athlete in history in the event, and it broke Michael Brinegar’s 2019 record of 14:27.50.
Jassen Yep’s 200 breaststroke from Saturday also made him the 3rd fastest performer in history, and was yet another team record. He finished in 1:48.30 to win the NCAA title in the event and break his teammate Josh Matheny’s 1:49.83 record from earlier in the season. The pre-season record was Ian Finnerty at 1:49.90 also from 2019.
Their final individual record was the men’s 100 freestyle, which went to Matt King’s prelims swim of 41.14. This time was just two-hundredths faster than Blake Pieroni’s 2018 record of 41.16.
Team record number 11 went to the 400 freestyle relay team of Owen McDonald (41.41), Matt King (40.78), Dylan Smiley (41.77), and Rafael Miroslaw (41.12) who went 2:45.08 coming in more than two seconds under the pre-season team record of 2:47.11 from Mohamad Hassan (42.40), Blake Pieroni (41.11), Bruno Blasokvic (41.84), Ali Khalafalia (41.76) in 2018.
New Indiana Team Records
| Event | Pre-Season Record | New Record |
| 50 Free | Van Mathias– 18.89 (2023) | Finn Brooks– 18.86 |
| 100 Free | Blake Pieroni– 41.16 (2018) | Matt King– 41.14 |
| 500 Free | Marwan Eklamash- 4:10.87 (2017) | Zalan Sarkany– 4:09.22 |
| 1650 Free | Michael Brinegar– 14:27.50 (2019) | Zalan Sarkany– 14:21.29 |
| 200 Back | Brendan Burns– 1:38.18 (2024) | Owen McDonald– 1:37.15 |
| 200 Breast | Ian Finnerty– 1:49.90 (2019) | Jassen Yep– 1:48.30 |
| 200 IM | Vini Lanza– 1:40.23 (2017) | Owen McDonald– 1:39.42 |
| 400 IM | Stephen Schmuhl– 3:40.64 (2014) | Zalan Sarkany– 3:40.64 |
| 200 Free Relay | 1:15.41 (Apple, Blaskovic, Samy, Hamlin) (2019) | 1:14.67 (Brooks, King, Lee, Smiley) |
| 400 Free Relay | 2:47.11 (Hassan, Pieroni, Blaskovic, Khalafalla) (2018) | 2:45.08 (McDonald, King, Smiley, Miroslaw) |
| 200 Medley Relay | 1:21.52 (Burns, Mathias, Frankel, Wight) (2023) | 1:20.92 (Barr, Benzing, Brooks, King) |
Knowing this is 99.99% likely to be the last swimswam article I’m ever mentioned in, can y’all fix the spelling of my name😅 Hamblin*
Just for this Swimswam should mention you in as many following articles as they can, with consistently wrong spelling.
Oh nooooo sorry bruv.
Off topic but made me wonder again…why does Virginia men’s swimming suck so bad. A program that dominates women’s swimming/recruiting year after year and it seems absolutely none of it has paid any dividends on the mens side? Social media lathered in a firehose of record breaking posts for the women is a sad barren wasteland on the mens side. Obviously next year looks better but why hasn’t it made any improvements over the last 5 years while the women decimated the world?
Nick Rhodes, huge freshman class coming in. No excuses now.
And still couldn’t beat the super powers that are Texas and Cal. Crazy
Frankel, Miroslaw, Knedla, Josh Matheny (lol) in that order choked horrifically. If those guys are even somewhat on IU would be national champs
Spin zone: Matheny didn’t choke, he’s just not good at yards