Division III Weekly Preview: MIT & Miami Invitationals at Epicenter

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Photo Courtesy: Allen Rich

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Only two teams in the top ten in Division III swam at invitationals before Thanksgiving, leading the door open for a lot of strong teams to make some noise as we head in to December and the second half of the season. Kenyon and Chicago were in action last weekend as the only top ten teams in the nation to swim at fall invites.

The Miami Invitational in Ohio will feature (#2/1) Emory and (#7/10) Wash U as well as strong Division I opponents in Miami (OH) and Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Emory women have won eight straight NCAA titles and will put Division III on notice this weekend when they race in Oxford. Based on duel meets, it looks to be Emory and Kenyon as early favorites as we hit the halfway point towards nationals in March.

The other main invite in Division III this weekend will be the MIT Invitational with hosts (#4/8) MIT, (#6/5) New York U, (#11/NR) Tufts and (NR/#21) Rensselaer. MIT and Tufts have not had a lot of competitions this year since they traditionally don’t start competing until November due to their strict academic standards. MIT and NYU both placed in the top ten a year ago and the two will be locking horns along with the Tufts men, who placed tenth at NCAA’s last year while NYU was fifth and MIT was eighth.

Speaking of east coast academic institutions, (#12/3) Williams will be swimming at Division I Boston College as this will be just their third meet on the season. (#5/4) Johns Hopkins will be taking on Division I teams Alabama, Rutgers, Columbia and Princeton at the Big Al Invite hosted by Princeton. The Blue Jays will be the only Division III team in attendance at that meet as it will be a competition between a lot of Ivy League teams.

Another top ten team that will only be swimming in a duel this weekend is (#9/15) Claremont McKenna-Harvey Mudd-Scripps College as they are hosting (#10/19) Pomona Pitzer in the battle of the long name California schools. CMS was only 14th on the men’s side and 22nd on the women’s side at NCAA’s a year ago as they have climbed up in to the top 15 in the duel meet rankings this season.

The last top ten team is (#13/8) Carnegie Mellon as they will be in action this weekend at the Total Performance Invitational hosted by Kenyon in Gambier. Kenyon, Louisville and Ohio State will also be at that invitational but they will most likely be sending their B team as the majority of those top swimmers will be swimming at Nationals this weekend, and Kenyon is coming off of the Ohio State Invite before Thanksgiving.

November 21 recap

November 13 recap

November 6 recap

October 30 recap

October 23 recap

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