Ranking The 2023 Men’s NCAA Recruiting Classes: Honorable Mentions

With the NCAA season upon us, we continue our annual rankings of the incoming recruiting classes for the 2023-24 campaign.

See also:

• Women’s #5-8
• Women’s #9-12
• Women’s #13-16
• Women’s Honorable Mentions
• Individual recruit rankings – Girls final rankings
• Individual recruit rankings – Boys final rankings

We continue our 2023 recruiting series with a team-by-team look at the best recruiting classes entering the NCAA next season. The classes below are projected freshmen for the 2023-2024 season.

A few important notes on our rankings:

• The rankings listed are based on our Class of 2023 Re-Rank. “HM” refers to our honorable mentions and “BOTR” refers to our Best of the Rest section for top-tier recruits.
• Like most of our rankings, these placements are subjective. We base our team ranks on a number of factors: prospects’ incoming times are by far the main factor, but we also consider potential upside in the class, class size, relay impact and team needs being filled. Greater weight is placed on known success in short course yards, so foreign swimmers are slightly devalued based on the difficulty in converting long course times to short course production.
• Transfers are included, though weighed less than recruits who came in with four seasons of eligibility.
• For the full list of all verbally committed athletes, click here. A big thank you to SwimSwam’s own Anne Lepesant for compiling that index – without it, rankings like these would be far less comprehensive.
• Some teams had not released a finalized 2023-24 team roster at the time these articles were published, meaning it’s possible we missed some names. Let us know in the comments below.

BEST NCAA SWIMMING & DIVING RECRUITING CLASSES: MEN’S CLASS OF 2023

Michigan: The Wolverines bring in the versatile Colin Geer, a 46.6/1:44.7 fly swimmer who also goes 1:44.7 in the 200 IM. Geer is coming off an impressive showing at U.S. Junior Nationals, earning top-10 finishes in the 100 fly (53.9) and 200 IM (2:02.4) in long course. Puerto Rican Josean Massucco is also strong in the 200 fly (1:45.9), while Ryan Healy is an all-around freestyler and IMer and Ethan Schwab (54.0/1:56.0) gives them an up-and-coming breaststroker.

LSU: A trio of European swimmers will help take some of the sting out of losing superstar Brooks Curry this season for LSU, as the Tigers add Croatians Jere Hribar and Karlo Percinic along with Bosnian Jovan Lekic. Hribar is the pure sprinter out of the bunch, owning long course personal bests of 22.1/49.2 in the 50/100 free, while Percinic and Lekic are both 50.8/1:48 in the 100 and 200. Lekic is also 3:51 in the 400 free and 15:17 in the 1500, while Percinic can also swim up to the 400 (or 500 in college) with a PB of 3:52.4. Hribar’s current ability projects at 19-low/42-high in yards, while Percinic and Lekic at 1:48 in the LC 200 free translates (roughly) out to 1:34 in SCY. It all depends on how they transition to not only yards, but also life in Baton Rouge, but all three have a chance to be competing at NCAAs this season.

Louisville: The Cardinals’ class is headlined by BOTR IMer Aidan Paro, who is a true all-arounder with very competitive bests in the 100 breast (54.8) and 100 fly (47.5) to go along with his 1:46.5 200 IM. Grant Gooding has a similar skillset, though he specializes in the 100 breast (53.5) and also goes 1:47 in the 200 IM and 20.3 in the 50 free, and Kayden Lancaster gives Louisville a good mid-distance option with LCM bests of 50.7/1:50.1/3:57.3 in the 100/200/400 free all set in the last seven months. In yards, Lancaster goes 1:36.4 in the 200 free. Danish prospect Kasper Johnsen has some intriguing lifetime bests in short course meters: 22.2/48.9 free, 23.8/52.3 back, and 24.6 in the 50 fly.

Kentucky: The Wildcats had no recruits ranked in our top-20/HM/BOTR in this class, but other than sprint free, have covered all the bases with some promising freshmen. Carson Hick (4:23/15:17) joins as a distance freestyler, Joshua Fisher is a good backstroker (48.2/1:45.8) with fly pedigree (47.8/1:46.0), Lance Johnson (54.3/1:57.8) is a breaststroker with IM ability (1:47.7/3:48.7), and Carter Ruthven (47.3/1:45.6) is intriguing in fly.

Navy: SwimSwam’s 14th-ranked recruit in the class, Ben Irwin gives Navy a top-tier backstroker and butterflier, as the SwimAtlanta product ranks top-five in the class across the 100 back (46.3), 200 back (1:41.8) and 200 fly (1:43.6) and has also cracked 20 in the 50 free. Ethan Gluck gives Irwin a good freshman training partner for the 200 fly (1:48.6), while Will Jones (48.8/1:45.0) will join him in the backstroke events.

Princeton: The Tigers bring in three impressive domestic recruits to go along with South African National Teamer Connor Buck, a distance freestyler who has been 3:59/8:15/15:45 in the long course pool (the 1500 projects to be something in the 15:20 range for the 1650 SCY). Daniel Li is extremely well-rounded with 19.9/44.3/1:37.9/4:26.4 free times, 48.1/1:47.4 on back, 48.8 in the 100 fly and 1:47 in the 200 IM. Noah Sech and Arthur Balva are also 1:47 IMers, with Sech specializing in breast (54.2/1:58.7, with a 1:02 LCM time), while Balva is a 47.7/1:44.5 butterflier.

Notre Dame: BOTR Lucas Logue highlights Notre Dame’s class as a backstroker on the rise, having made the 100 back ‘A’ final at Junior Nationals (LCM) in two straight seasons. The Fighting Irish also bring in graduate transfers Abdelrahman Elaraby (Louisville) and Tanner Filion (D3 Whitman College), who should both have an impact at the NCAA Championships. Elaraby is the reigning ACC champion in the 50 free (18.79), and is also sub-42 in the 100 free and was a finalist this past summer at the World Championships in the 50 fly. Filion is the NCAA Division III record holder in the 200 back, with his best of 1:41.17 putting him just four-tenths shy of D1 scoring territory.

South Carolina: The Gamecocks bring in freestyler Raymond Prosinksi, who owns bests of 1:37.8/4:24.7/15:16 in the 200/500/1650 and could also end up focusing on IM in college (1:48.5/3:47.5). Turkey has become a distance free factory in recent years, and Umut Yildirim is another, joining South Carolina with SCM times of 3:51/7:54/15:02.

North Carolina: The Tar Heels add NCHSAA state champion Ben Delmar, a 54.2/1:55.0 breaststroker with a 1:48.0 200 IM, and TAC Titans product Colin Whelehan, who is a strong butterflier (47.6/1:46.4) and is also a similar 200 IMer to Delmar.