Morning Splash: Bold Race-By-Race Predictions for Men’s NCAA Championships

Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

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By David Rieder.

Picking race winners—sometimes straightforward and sometimes an exercise in futility. For last week’s women’s NCAA championships, the results fell somewhere in that first category, nailing 13 out of 18 winners.

With only hours to go until the start of the men’s meet, time for another shot at this. And why should it not go well? In certain events (the men’s sprint freestyles and men’s backstrokes, plus others), it would take a massive upset to knock off the established favorites and defending champs. (As for the relays, those are far tougher.)

For the rest of your men’s NCAA previewing pleasure, check out our scoring breakdown analysis, a look ahead to the meet’s diving events, episodes of Off Deck previewing the team race and individual storylines and, from last week, what makes the NCAA championships unique.

Day One

800 Free Relay
1. Texas
2. NC State
3. Florida
* The Longhorns will be hard to beat if they load up with Townley Haas, Jack Conger, Joseph Schooling and Clark Smith.

Day Two

200 Free Relay
1. Florida
2. NC State
3. Texas
*The Gators have Caeleb Dressel, and no one else does.

500 Free
1. Clark Smith, Texas
2. Townley Haas, Texas
3. Grant Shoults, Stanford
*Smith reclaims his NCAA title after rough junior year championship meet.

200 IM
1. Will Licon, Texas
2. Chase Kalisz, Georgia
3. Ryan Murphy, Cal
*Going with the three veterans, even though Andreas Vazaios and Andrew Seliskar have been most impressive this season.

50 Free
1. Caeleb Dressel, Florida
2. Ryan Held, NC State
3. Paul Powers, Michigan
*Dressel is aiming to become the first man to go under 18. Does Joseph Schooling swim this or scratch in favor of five relays?

400 Medley Relay
1. Texas
2. Cal
3. Missouri
*If John Shebat gives the Longhorns anything on the backstroke leg, this relay will be hard to stop.

Day Three

400 IM
1. Chase Kalisz, Georgia
2. Jay Litherland, Georgia
3. Andrew Seliskar, Cal
*Kalisz should break his own American record of 3:34.50. SEC teams will score big here, and Gunnar Bentz (Georgia) and Mark Szaranek (Florida) were the toughest omissions.

100 Fly
1. Joseph Schooling, Texas
2. Caeleb Dressel, Florida
3. Jack Conger, Texas
*Schooling should break his own NCAA record of 44.01 and possibly have company under 44 seconds.

200 Free
1. Townley Haas, Texas
2. Blake Pieroni, Indiana
3. Maxime Rooney, Florida
*Can Haas break the 1:30-barrier, and how will impressive freshmen Dean Farris and Cameron Craig factor in?

100 Breast
1. Fabien Schwingenschlogl, Missouri
2. Will Licon, Texas
3. Brandon Fiala, Virginia Tech
*Licon will take on the defending champ in his first-ever NCAA appearance in the 100 breast.

100 Back
1. Ryan Murphy, Cal
2. Shane Ryan, Penn State
3. Connor Oslin, Alabama
*Olympic gold medalist should dominate and possibly challenge his own American record.

200 Medley Relay
1. Cal
2. NC State
3. Missouri
*Freshmen Pawel Sendyk and Michael Jensen have been important plug-in pieces for the Golden Bears.

Day Four

1650 Free
1. Clark Smith, Texas
2. True Sweetser, Stanford
3. Jordan Wilimovsky, Northwestern
*Any of the men in the final heat could finish top three in what figures to be a highly-strategic race.

200 Back
1. Ryan Murphy, Cal
2. Grigory Tarasevich, Louisville
3. Christopher Reid, Alabama
*Murphy finishes his college career four-for-four in NCAA titles in the backstroke events.

100 Free
1. Caeleb Dressel, Cal
2. Ryan Held, NC State
3. Blake Pieroni, Indiana
*Tough to leave Michael Chadwick out of the top three. Dressel should make a run at the 40-second barrier, but the prediction is he falls short.

200 Breast
1. Will Licon, Texas
2. Fabien Schwingenschlogl, Missouri
3. Anton McKee, Alabama
*Licon heavily favored to win third-straight NCAA title in this distance.

200 Fly
1. Jack Conger, Texas
2. Joseph Schooling, Texas
3. Pace Clark, Georgia
*Conger finally turns the tables on Schooling and wins his first individual NCAA title in his final race as a Longhorn.

400 Free Relay
1. NC State
2. Texas
3. Florida
*Wolfpack win this relay for second-consecutive season.

Agree? Disagree? Well, that’s what the comment’s section is for. Looking forward to hearing why I’m wrong!

All commentaries are the opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Swimming World Magazine nor its staff.

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6 Comments

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Paul Windrath

7 years ago

Under 17??

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David Rieder - Senior Writer

7 years ago

Reply to Paul Windrath

That would be impressive, wouldn’t it? Under 18, it should say. Corrected.

Philip Vranić

7 years ago

Mackenzie Holden

Uba

7 years ago

Schooling wins both fly events.

Swim Fast

7 years ago

According to the Heat Sheets, your predictions are justified but I’m thinking Shane Ryan could be Top 3 in the 100 Free & possibly in the 50 Free. He has no Relays to worry about. Don’t count him out.

Mark J

7 years ago

I agree with Uba with Schooling winning both the Fly events