NCAA Relay Qualifying Update: UGA Leads The Way With All 10 Relays In

The University of Georgia is the only school in the NCAA with all ten relays already qualified for the NCAA Championships.

The Bulldogs have hit qualifying or provisional standards in all five women’s relays and all five men’s relays as of December 15. The only other programs to qualify all five relays already are the NC State women, Texas women, and Texas A&M men.

As with all of our college coverage today, these lists come with the caveat that the ACC, SEC and Big 12 have competed more often than the Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences amid coronavirus pandemic restrictions, and we’d expect those two conferences to add a larger number of qualifiers later on in the season.

Qualifying Procedure

Here’s the most simplified version for NCAA relay qualifying:

Teams that hit a “qualifying standard” (sometimes colloquially referred to as an “A” cut) automatically qualify for NCAAs in that relay. That school can then enter any other relays at NCAAs as long as it has a “provisional standard,” or “B” cut.

There are some wrinkles involving individual qualifiers, but since those lists are still very much in flux, we’ll look at the teams with qualifying and provisional relay standards already this year:

Teams Already Qualified

Women

Qualifying Standards

200 free relay

• NC State: 1:27.00
• Virginia: 1:27.37

400 free relay

• Virginia: 3:11.43
• NC State: 3:14.34
• Tennessee: 3:14.35

800 free relay

• none

200 medley relay

• Virginia: 1:34.35
• NC State: 1:34.86
• Texas: 1:35.78
• Missouri: 1:36.00

400 medley relay

• Texas: 3:26.86
• Virginia: 3:29.16
• NC State: 3:29.46
• Georgia: 3:31.56

Full Qualifying List

Alabama (400 free relay, 800 free relay) has two provisional standards and would join the list in both of those relays if the team can hit a qualifying standard in any relay.

Kentucky (800 free relay) and UNC (400 free relay) also have provisional standards this year and could swim those relays if they can hit a qualifying standard at some point.

Men

Qualifying Standards

200 free relay

• Georgia: 1:16.35
• Texas A&M: 1:16.48
• Texas: 1:16.99
• Florida: 1:17.01

400 free relay

• Georgia: 2:49.27
• Virginia: 2:49.84
• Alabama: 2:50.42
• Missouri: 2:50.70

800 free relay

• Texas: 6:07.34
• NC State: 6:14.44
• Georgia: 6:16.42

200 medley relay

• Texas: 1:23.58
• Georgia: 1:23.60
• Georgia Tech: 1:23.89
• Texas A&M: 1:24.21

400 medley relay

• Texas: 3:04.64
• Georgia Tech: 3:05.89

Full Qualifying List

UNC (200 medley relay) and Tennessee (400 medley relay) have provisional standards and would be able to swim those relays if they can hit a qualifying standard at some point.