Evan Pinion, out of local team Pilot Aquatic Club, has announced that he’ll be staying close to home next year. He recently committed to Tennessee, where he’ll make an immediate impact as a member of their distance group.
Pinion’s a 1:38.0/4:24.3/15:12 freestyler, which will be huge for Tennessee as they’ll look to him for help on the 800 free relay as well as to be a major point scorer in his individual events
Though Tennessee added a few distance swimmers in their freshman class this year, like Trevor Leland and Manny Mendoza, they’re still spread fairly thin in the distance events. Junior Sam Petersen is their best right now with best times of 4:26 and 15:22, but Pinion has already been faster than that.
Pinion is the top 400 meter/500 yard freestyler for his class. He was 3:51 at Olympic Trials, and then 3:52 at Junior Pan Pacs.
Pinion is way better than a top 20 recruit!! How are you aquiring these rankings?
I think that Tennessee is a really good fit for Evan. As most anyone who is involved in swimming should well know, somebody can have a great focus meet one year, and the next year, one thing can go wrong (they get sick, the get injured, they are over trained, or they aren’t tapered properly) and their performance looks off. That can happen to anyone. I think that coach will do great things with Evan. Best of luck.
It looks like Tennessee is poised to make a big statement in the distance frees with Pinion and Heron (http://swimswam.com/2012/10/trio-of-jr-national-team-men-select-arizona-tennessee-indiana/). Nice to see a college program building that depth of distance talent.
Yes Evan Pinion had really impressed at the junior short course national championships in 2010. In 2011 he had confirmed at the world junior championships. But this year he hasn’t much improved. I saw him as the future american distance freestyle star and USA desperately needs some fast swimmers from the 200 free to the 1500 free on the men’s side. We’ll see his future.
Pinion was on fire at that Winter Jrs in 2010. He swam very well at Junior Pan Pacs as well. I like the old school no cap wearers.
According to USA swimming, Pinion went 4:18.8 at 2010 winter juniors.
And a 15:02 at the same meet…I was expecting to see same very fast times from him this year SC and assumed that he was focused on LC and OT. His 3:51 LC 400 free at OT is pretty much in line with his best 500 free so not sure what that tells me (granted that is still a very good swim for a teenager). I have a feeling that this might be a very good match and Pinion will swim very well working with Kredich.