ACC Weekly Preview: Triangle Area Rivalries Wrap Up Dual Meet Season

2016.03.25 NCAA Mens Swimming Championships_North Carolina Jack Nyquist

Photo Courtesy: Reagan Lunn/Georgia Tech Athletics

It’s the last week of ACC dual meets before we move into championship season, and that means two things: senior day presentations before almost every meet and some of the top ACC rivalries come to swimming as NC State welcomes North Carolina before the Tar Heels head home to face Duke.

The dual meet season has not been kind to North Carolina so far. The women’s and men’s teams have both swum against Georgia, Tennessee, Louisville, Navy and Virginia. They swept Navy and were swept by the other four. So this weekend will mark one last chance to pick up a win against an ACC or Power-Five opponent.

North Carolina’s trip to Raleigh will be its first since the 2015 meet against NC State when the rising Wolfpack men’s squad dominated their rivals, 180-118. That, of course, was just a precursor to NC State’s two ACC championships and a top-five finish at the NCAA championships last season.

This year’s No. 3 NC State team is packed with talent: Ryan Held, Anton Ipsen and Hennessey Stuart are just a few of those names. The UNC men’s team has struggled this year, most recently losing at home to Virginia for the first time in four years. Senior transfer Jorden Merrilees has been a standout in the distance events, but NC State counters with Ipsen and Adam Linker. This meet could end up one-sided.

The women’s meet will be more competitive, as the UNC women were just edged out by the Wolfpack at an invitational in Greensboro earlier this year, 1938-1845.5. Senior Hellen Moffitt and junior sprinter Caroline Baldwin will lead the Tar Heels against NC State and Duke, while NC State’s sprint corps remains strong to go along with Olympic Trials finalist Hannah Moore in the distance and IM races.

A day later, at UNC’s senior day, Duke makes the short trek down 15-501 to Chapel Hill. Across all sports, Duke-Carolina rivalry has been one of the best in country but not so much in swimming. The Duke men last beat UNC in 1939, and the Blue Devil women have never won against the Tar Heels.

It won’t be shocking if one or both of those streaks is broken this weekend. The Duke women have strong depth in the sprints and the butterfly events (particularly with Maddie Rusch, Leah Goldman and Alyssa Marsh) that could help them keep up with North Carolina.

On the men’s side, it’s breaststroke depth (led by Peter Kropp) and sprint depth (sophomore Yusuke Legard has made a jump in year two) that would be keys for an upset of the Tar Heels. Both men’s and women’s squads for both schools have strong divers, although UNC’s Elissa Dawson and Jack Nyquist are the best of the bunch.

Also on Saturday, NC State stays at home to welcome the Virginia Cavaliers. Yes, one week after being in town to swim UNC and Duke, UVA is coming back to Raleigh for a meet against NC State. Although the UVA men are certainly back on the upswing after a three-year dry spell (Zach Fong, Brendan Casey and Sam Magnan are big reasons why), the Cavaliers will likely struggle to keep up with the Wolfpack, particularly in Raleigh.

The NC State women will likely face similar struggles in keeping up with Virginia, and this will be the final college dual meet anywhere for Leah Smith and Kaitlyn Jones. NC State looks like the second-best women’s team in the conference, just as it was last year, but the gap to the Cavaliers remains wide.

Meanwhile, up in the Midwest, Louisville travels to Bloomington to take on Indiana in what should be a great test for the Cardinals. The latest CSCAA poll had Mallory Comerford and the Louisville women at No. 10, four spots ahead of Lilly King and Indiana.

The men’s poll ranked Indiana No. 4 and Louisville No. 7. Backstroker Grigory Tarasevich and breaststroker Carlos Claverie are the headliners for the Cardinals, but the biggest test of the weekend will come in the freestyles, where Trevor Carroll will be tasked with keeping up with the Hoosiers’ Blake Pieroni.

The final ACC meet of the weekend will take place in Atlanta when Georgia Tech welcomes Florida State and the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD) to town. The match-up between the No. 18 FSU men and No. 25 GT men should be plenty competitive with Moises Loschi and Rodrigo Castro having solid years for the Yellow Jackets and sprinters Chad Mylin and Jason McCormick leading an impressive Seminole sprint group.

Elsewhere, Pittsburgh will host Duquesne, Carnegie Mellon, Clarion, California University and St. Francis (Pa.) in the Western Pennsylvania Invite, and Notre Dame will also be hosting a two-day meet, the Shamrock Invitational.

In a battle for Boston bragging rights, Boston College heads into the city to visit Boston University, and Nova Southeastern will take on Miami in Coral Gables.

Full schedule:

Shamrock Invitational at Notre Dame, Friday & Saturday
Western Pennsylvania Invite at Pittsburgh, 1 p.m. Friday & 11 a.m. Saturday
North Carolina at NC State, 5 p.m. Friday
Florida State & SCAD at Georgia Tech, 11 a.m. Saturday
Nova Southeastern at Miami, 12 p.m. Saturday
Duke at North Carolina, 1 p.m. Saturday
Boston College at Boston University, 1:30 p.m. Saturday
Virginia at NC State, 4 p.m. Saturday

Name*

Email*

Welcome to our community. We invite you to join our discussion. Our community guidelines are simple: be respectful and constructive, keep on topic, and support your fellow commenters. Commenting signifies that you agree to our Terms of Use

Name*

Email*

3 Comments

Oldest

Newest Most Voted

Inline Feedbacks

View all comments

Tarheelfan

7 years ago

Caroline baldwin is a junior not a senior

Author

David Rieder - Senior Writer

7 years ago

Reply to Tarheelfan

Right. Fixed that. Thanks!

NotaTarheelfan

7 years ago

Boom. Roasted.