2022 PAC 12 WOMEN’S SWIMMING & DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Wednesday, February 23-Saturday, February 26, 2022
- Weyerhaeuser King County Aquatic Center, Federal Way, Washington
- Defending champions: Cal (1x)
- Start Times: 10:30am prelims / 6:00 pm finals (PT)
- Event Schedule
- 2021 Scoring Breakdown
- How to Watch
- Championship Central
- Psych Sheets
- Live Results
- Live Results via Meet Mobile – “2022 Pac-12 Women’s Swimming & Diving Champs”
USC senior Laticia Transom has exhibitioned the 50 free prelims on Thursday morning at the Pac-12 Championships. That decision comes in spite of having the second-fastest split of the entire field in prelims at 22.12, behind only Stanford’s Taylor Ruck (22.10).
What makes that decision for Transom peculiar, far from the only swimmer to exhibition the race, is that she only had three individual entries in the meet. That implies that USC intends to use her on all five of the team’s relays this week as their best sprint freestyler.
On Wednesday, Transom split 21.61 on the Trojans’ runner-up 200 medley relay anchor that finished in 1:35.40 (recovering from a Calypso Sheridan slip on the start). That was the fastest freestyle split in the field.
She then came back after the break and led off the team’s 800 free relay in 1:43.96: a relay that placed 5th in 7:06.61. Her teammates were all 1:47s.
While the Trojans have some good pieces, they are not deep, especially in the short freestyle races. That means that any relay qualifications will be dependent on Transom’s participation.
Even with that in mind, the decision doesn’t make sense from a scoring perspective at the conference level – the number of points she would have scored from an A-final finish in the 50 free far outweighs the few points from an improvement in relay standing (and even in the 800, her absence wouldn’t have cost USC any points).
The 800 free relay missed the “B” standard by 7-tenths of a second, so her presence there didn’t even get the team a new relay qualification for the NCAA Championships. Thanks to their “A” standard swims in relays (midseason), USC only needs “B” standards in remaining relay races to qualify those teams for NCAAs as well.
Thanks in part to a big diving performance, USC sits in 2nd place after one day of competition, behind only Stanford.
Team Scores:
- Stanford – 216
- USC – 211
- Arizona – 158
- Utah – 154
- UCLA – 145
- Cal – 110
- Arizona State – 102
- Washington State – 88
Rumor has it she wants the night off to catch the new episode of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”.
If you’re going to finish third in the conference regardless doesn’t this move make a ton of sense? I would think you want to maximize the potential number of people you send to nationals. If the swimmer is on board – and ripping 1:43 kinda indicative she is- then this is a really smart move.
It kind of sort of makes sense if 1) you think you’re locked in for 3rd, and 2) it works.
It didn’t work, though, and you can also always swim time trials in relays to get athletes over their maximum events.
I think 5 relays at a conference meet is not a move that most coaches would make.
That 800 relay wasn’t going anywhere with three legs at 1:47. Not sure the thought process on this one.
This seems exactly right. USC is likely getting 3rd at this meet regardless and they needed her split to get near the B cut since the other girls have flat start/relay bests around 1:46-1:47. Didn’t pan out, but they had a reasonable shot at it given the swimmers. Transom is already qualified and is the only outright 200 freestyler on that team.
And while it’s been said recently that conference finishes sometimes result in bigger bonuses for coaches than NCAA finishes, I’m not sure Lea Maurer even has those provisions given she’s an interim head coach. So it would seem qualifying more relays for NCAAs is the bigger goal here.