NCAA Swimming Championships

[Nfred38]

So I am a little late here as a couple of Pitt women competed last week at NCAAs in the diving portion so I will start off talking about how they performed.

Junior diver Amy Reed competed in her first NCAA championships this season after qualifying for last year's canceled meet, qualifying for all three diving events, the first time a Pitt Panther had ever done that. In her first event, the 1 meter diving, she scored 237.65 points, good enough for a 43rd place finish. Next up, she had the 3-meter diving event, scoring 256.50 points, placing higher than her previous event at 37th place. Her final event of the meet was her signature platform diving. There she scored 233.05 points, garnering Reed her highest finish of the meet at 27th place. Hopefully Reed will be able to build off of the momentum she gained by actually being able to compete at the meet this year and move into scoring range at next year's meet.

The other Pitt diver who competed last week was freshman Claire McDaniels. McDaniels only had the platform to focus on, where she scored 212.80 points, earning her a 36th place finish. While the panthers came away from the women's meet with no points to show for it, having two athletes compete who will also be back next year is good for the program and can help build momentum amongst the diving program in particular.

 

[Nfred38]

This week has begun the men's portion of the meet. Seven Pitt athletes will be competing this week including Blaise Vera (50 free, 100 free, 100 fly, 200 medley relay), Cooper Van Der Laan (100 breast, 200 breast, 200 medley relay), Stephan Hopta (200 medley Relay), Szymon Pytlarcyzk (200 medley relay), Wesley Ahart (platform), Josh Parquet (1-meter), and Dylan Reed (1-meter, 3-meter).

So far Blaise Vera has already qualified for an A-final in the first night of individual racing in the 50 free, where he went a 19.17, .08 slower than his seed time. Vera is set to be the first Pitt All-American in the 50 free since 1928. He will be looking to be the first swimmer in Pitt history to break the 19 second barrier tonight. This afternoon, divers Dylan Reed and Josh Parquet both competed in the 1-meter diving event. Reed scored 283.85 points, giving him a 27th place finish. Parquet reeled in 222.25 points, giving him 43rd place in his first ever NCAA championships.

Tonight Vera will be swimming in the 50 free final and tomorrow he will be competing in the 100 butterfly as well as Van Der Laan competing in the 100 breaststroke. Also, the 200 medley relay will be contested at night which will feature the remaining Pitt swimmers on the NCAA roster. The panthers should most certainly be able to come away with points tomorrow evening in a variety of different events.

 

[Nfred38]

Yesterday evening Blaise Vera became Pitt's highest placing male swimmer at the NCAA championships since 1980 by finishing in 7th in the 50 free. While he added time from his seed time, Vera was still about to move up one spot and grab 12 points for the panthers.

This morning Vera will be swimming again in the 100 butterfly. Along with Vera will be junior Cooper Van Der Laan swimming in the 100 breaststroke.

 

[Nfred38]

Busy week and it was very difficult for me to keep up this thread. Apologies for the delayed results.

Friday morning started off on a down note with Blaise Vera finishing in 25th place in the 100 butterfly after coming into the event seeded 12th. Had he gone his seed time in the morning session, he would have made in back in 10th place. While the 100 fly was a bit of a let down, the 100 breaststroke was much more positive. Junior Cooper Van Der Laan came into the event seeded 11th and bettered his seeded by placing 8th in the morning session. This gave the Pitt men two All-American swimmers for the first time in program history. He ended up finishing in 8th place at finals, and with two seniors in the final, Van Der Laan is in line to do very well at next year's championships.

The evening session also included the 200 medley relay where Pitt finished in 20th place. While Pitt dropped two places from their seed and didn't score any points, senior Blaise Vera came back to into the finals session with a vengeance after not making it back in the 100 butterfly. In the medley relay, Vera split a 19.52 in the butterfly leg of the race which was the third fastest split of all time. The only person to be faster is 2016 Olympic gold medalist Joseph Schooling who had gone 19.36 and 19.45 in 2016 and 2017. Given that Schooling swims internationally for Singapore, this would mean that Vera has the fastest 50 butterfly relay split ever recorded by an American.

The meet concluded on Saturday with Vera competing the the 100 free and Van Der Laan competing in the 200 breaststroke. Vera qualified for the B-final in the 100 free touching the wall in 15th place. While Van Der Laan gave a valient effort, the long meet caught up to his body and he finished in 34th place after being seeded 11th. That night at finals, Vera moved up into 12th place with a time of 42.40, giving Pitt 5 points on the day.

Pitt finished the meet in 26th place, just 1 point behind Notre Dame, 3 behind UNC, and 4.5 behind Florida State. Given that each of those teams had more competitors compete than Pitt goes to show the top end talent that Pitt's roster had this year. Also just to show, Penn State finished 31st with 13 points and West Virginia 32nd with 5 points.

Cooper Van Der Laan will be back for his senior year with the Panther's next year and they will look to continue to develop their young talent to try and get more swimmers to the championship meet next season. The jury is still out on whether or not Blaise Vera will return next year as he does have an extra year of eligibility given out by the NCAA this year. While he definitely achieved more than any Pitt swimmer has in a very long time this season, the itch to avenge his 100 butterfly or finally get under the 19-second barrier may just be enough to keep him around for another season. I will keep you updated as more information comes out.

Up next for Pitt swimming is for those who qualified for Olympic trials to continue to train and see how they do there. Pitt has a couple of swimmers who will be competing for spots on teams around the globe such as Van Der Laan (Australia), Serhii Ahadzhanian (Ukraine), Wojciech Dutkowiak (Poland), Armin Remenyi (Hungary), and Shahar Menahem (Israel).