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NCAA Women’s Preview: Can Anyone Match Stanford?

While the men’s NCAA national championship is shaping up to be a dogfight between Cal and Texas, Stanford looks like it is comfortably in control of the women’s side. With a first place finish last year by over 150 points of runner-up Cal and over 200 points over third-place Texas A&M and only one significant senior loss (Lia Neal), one would naturally think that Stanford is again the team to beat this year

Let’s take a look into the data with the Swimulator

At first glance, the raw Swimulated results based off of each swimmer’s top times at this point in the season point to a tight meet between Stanford, Texas A&M, and Cal.

  1. Stanford 380
  2. Texas A&M 367
  3. California 364
  4. Louisville 255
  5. Michigan 242

 

However, as we dive deeper into the data, the race isn’t as close as it first appears. Here’s a breakdown of Stanford’s estimated scores.

Stanford
Stanford Relay 118
Ledecky, Katie 60
Eastin, Ella 51
Hu, Janet 43
Drabot, Katie 42
Forde, Brooke 25
Howe, Ally 25
Kukurugya, Hannah 6
Stevens, Leah 6
Szekely, Allie 4

An average time simulation puts Stanford on top by over 150 points over second place Michigan.

  1. Stanford 467
  2. Michigan 307
  3. Texas 264
  4. Southern Cali 246
  5. Texas A&M 235

Average time simulations are better in certain respects in that the factor in more total swims per swimmer. Predicting a swimmer’s taper time based off of their average times in season is better than just using their top mid-season time. However, the projections can be thrown off for teams that tend to swim different events in their mid-season tapers than in duals, so when they are wrong they can be quite wrong.

In both simulations, Stanford is hurt by three other large factors.

  1. One of Stanford’s top two swimmers and defending NCAA champion in the 50 and 100 free, Simone Manuel, hasn’t swum yet this year due to an injury. It sounds likely that she will be back before the end of the year. A full strength return of Manuel means around an extra 40-80 points for Stanford including relays. Its possible she isn’t at 100% this year, but her 100% last season was so fast that she will still likely have a huge impact.
  2. Stanford’s 800 free relay isn’t counted as scoring yet since they haven’t swum one so far this year. They won NCAAs last year by over five seconds in that event and another victory looks likely this season.
  3. Stanford has a returning diver, Cassidy Cook, who finaled on both the 1 and 3 meter boards. None of the other schools ranked in the top four had any divers score last year.

At this point last year, Stanford also looked like it had a tight race with Cal for the top spot and a modest lead over Georgia in third and ended up blowing both of of the water at nationals. Without some serious moves by another team, all signs point to this year being more of the same.

The competition

From our mid-season projections, Texas A&M has a couple of swimmers projected to significantly improve on their scores from last season. Some of these because of legit improvements over last season – Lisa Bratton‘s 1:50.10 200 backstroke leads the nation at this point and Beryl Gastaldello has already bested her 50 and 100 free times. But given that Texas A&M tapers less (1%) compared to their top mid-season times compared to Stanford and Cal (1.5% and 2%), I see them as less likely to move up significantly.

Texas A&M
Texas A&M Relay 134
Pickrem, Sydney 48
Galat, Bethany 44
Gastaldello, Beryl 38
Bratton, Lisa 38
Caneta, Jorie 20
Rasmus, Claire 17
Belousova, Anna 16
Gonzalez Medina, Esther 12
Quah, Jing 1

Cal, on the other hand also returns most of their talent from last year and does have a larger average taper than Stanford does. The return stars Kathleen Baker, Katie McLaughlin, and Abbey Weitzeil. However, the loss of sprinter Farida Osman will be difficult to replace. At this point, I don’t see them leaving as many points on the board as Stanford.

California
California Relay 174
Baker, Kathleen 56
Weitzeil, Abbey 46
Bilquist, Amy 39
Thomas, Noemie 29
McLaughlin, Katie 12
Darcel, Sarah 7
Murphy, Maddie 2

Louisville and Michigan round out the top five in the rankings. While they look to be ahead of the rest of the pack at this point, they certainly have their work cut out to catch up.

Anything is still possible, but at this point in the season it will take a lot for Stanford’s women’s team not to repeat as national champions.

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S. Kloss
6 years ago

Agree with what LONGSEEKER said below. Stanford in swimming is like Alabama in football. When they aren’t #1 or don’t win the NCAA’s then they should be embarrassed. I would assume that any recruit contemplating Stanford these days has to wonder whether they will even get noticed on the team or travel with the squad unless they are already swimming in the final heats of the Olympic Trials before they graduate high school. The junior national princesses that swam in Knoxville in December (you know who you are) will as expected choose Stanford and come sophomore year feel the anxiety and concern that the next wave of incoming freshman women might be even faster than them. The best stories are… Read more »

Kevin Hallman
Reply to  S. Kloss
6 years ago

I’m sure its not right for everyone, but Stanford actually ranks pretty high in our overall program rankings: https://staging.swimswam.com/swimulator/?type=programs&gender=Women&division=D1&conference=All. They’re ahead of Cal and close to Texas A&M, mostly based off their ability to recruit and retain really good swimmers. Retaining swimmers is actually more important than improving them for successful programs.

Actually, Alabama actually over performs based off of their recruiting classes: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/which-college-football-teams-do-the-most-with-the-least-talent-and-vice-versa/. I hate to say it but Saban is a dang good coach as well as recruiter.

Aggie Swim Fan
6 years ago

I’m prejudiced but I predict a “dog fight” between A&M & The Farm for the National Championship. It will be close. We might not get those “can’t miss” coming out of high school but we know how to develop those that we do get!!

KNOW IT ALL
6 years ago

This discussion would be a lot different if Missy were around with Kathleen, Amy, Katie, and so on.

However, Texas A&M is fairly deep with top players in many events. The dual meet wasn’t a blow out.

Dcrabbe6
6 years ago

Where is Simone at?

Dcrabbe6
Reply to  Dcrabbe6
6 years ago

Nvm

Person
Reply to  Dcrabbe6
6 years ago

https://staging.swimswam.com/simone-manuel-explains-injury-video/

Also mentioned in this article, but she’s out of competition due to a hip injury. Apparently she’s cleared to start competing this month.

Shawn
Reply to  Dcrabbe6
6 years ago

1:44 today against Arizona. Guess that answers if she’s back!

Swammerjammer
6 years ago

The depth and breadth of swimming talent and fierceness in the NCAA is inspiring and the women spur each other on…it’s going to be great competition and it’s all great for the sport.

Hambone
6 years ago

Is Simone Manuel out?

Hambone
Reply to  Hambone
6 years ago

oops, should have read more closely.

CraigH
Reply to  Hambone
6 years ago

She just popped a 1:44.2 200 Free in her first Dual Meet of the season today. Pretty solid.

Steve Nolan
6 years ago

i think you guys are underesimating the dawgs.

but not georgia. thos are the wrong dawgs.

i’m talkin bout the nc state pre-dawgs!!!

ooooooo0oOO0o0oooooooWWWWwwwwww!!!!

(that’s a wolf howlin sill)

Coach
6 years ago

Kal will konquer hahahahahahah sucks for you trees

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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