Cal Men's Swimming and Diving Still in the Hunt for an NCAA Championship

After three days, Cal is down 55.5 points on Texas and up 8.5 points on Indiana

credit: calbears.com

Through three days in Federal Way, this meet has been every bit as advertised. Texas was bolstered by a couple of transfers (Chris Guiliano and Hubert Kos) when Bob Bowman took over for the retired legend, Eddie Reese. Cal has a majority veteran team with one last NCAA championship of eligibility to tie the bow on an illustrious collegiate career for many seniors and graduate students. Indiana also benefitted from a couple of ASU transfers (Owen McDonald and Zalan Sarkany) along with a graduate transfer (from Texas), Casper Corbeau. While the overall point total through 14 events isn’t the closest it has been in the last couple of years, the projections for the final day suggest that the gap between first and third place could be 20 points, which is the points awarded for winning an individual event. It’ll be an exciting day four as Cal aims to extend its top-two streak for a 15th consecutive year.

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Standings (Top 10 as of Event 14)

1. Texas 368

2. California 312.5

3. Indiana 304

4. Florida 233

5. Georgia 177.5

6. Arizona St 172

7. Tennessee 162.5

8. Stanford 162

9. NC State 128

10. Michigan 83

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Day 3 Recap

Here is where Cal placed in every event last night:

100 butterfly

Dare Rose (4th) - 43.52 **PB, School Record

400 individual medley

Lucas Henveaux (3rd) - 3:36.22 **PB

Tyler Kopp (10th) - 3:37.75 **PB

Humberto Najera (14th) - 3:39.99 **PB

200 freestyle

Gabriel Jett (3rd) - 1:30.08 **PB

Jack Alexy (5th) - 1:30.28

Robin Hanson (13th) - 1:31.93

100 breaststroke

Yamato Okadome (7th) - 50.69
Hank Rivers (16th) - 51.63

100 backstroke

Mewen Tomac (4th) - 43.94 **PB

Destin Lasco (5th) - 44.10

Bjorn Seeliger (12th) - 44.85

3-meter

Joshua Thai (16th) - 307.65

400 medley relay

Cal (4th) - 2:59.12

Splits:

Mewen Tomac - 44.05

Yamato Okadome - 50.45

Dare Rose - 43.39

Destin Lasco - 41.23

After 14 events, Cal is down 55.5 points to Texas and up 8.5 points to Indiana.

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Day 4 Review

Since 2019, the team leading after the penultimate day has won the team battle, which would be Texas.

1650 freestyle

Projected finalists: Texas: 2/0, Cal: 1/0, Indiana: 1/0

Texas has 2 of the top 3 seeds in this with David Johnston and Rex Maurer, the latter of whom has won 2 individual titles already this week. Lucas Henveaux is the 2nd seed and Indiana’s Zalan Sarkany is the 8th seed and the defending champion in this event. Texas has a 3rd entrant, Jackson Huckabay, but he was off his best time in the 500 freestyle, which he set at the conference championships 6 weeks ago.

Cal hasn’t always had a scorer in this event, but in 2014 and 2019, a strong swim from a relatively low seed has helped provide a spark for the Bears en route to national championships in both those years. Tyler Kopp, the 30th seed and Cal’s other entrant, could be that spark of electricity. He doesn’t have a best time that would score currently, but he dropped about 3 seconds in the 400 individual medley, which suggests an incredibly high level of fitness. If he can get into the top 16, it might be the catalyst Cal would need to catch Texas.

200 backstroke

Projected finalists: Texas: 1/1, Cal: 3/1, Indiana: 1/0

This event has been Cal’s bread-and-butter for over a decade now. Texas’ Hubert Kos has been on a tear this meet with two individual titles and the NCAA record in the 100 backstroke. He’s also been bested by Destin Lasco two years in a row. Alongside Lasco are two Calympians in this event, Mewen Tomac and Keaton Jones. Tomac was impressive in the 100 backstroke, but he’s better in this event. Jones has been right around his best times in his other two events in this meet. However, the newcomer for Cal is Gabriel Jett. He typically swims the 200 butterfly on the last day, but he’s been superb in this event throughout the year, so he’s changing up his lineup. The danger for Cal, however, is that when you have this many potential scorers in an event, you may end up pushing each other out of finals.

Humberto Najera dropped quite a bit of time in the 400 individual medley so if he finds a similar improvement curve in this event, he may end up in the consolation final. And, if Lasco, Tomac, Jett, and Jones can all find a lane in the championship final alongside Najera getting into the B-final, there’s an opportunity for Cal to grab an extra 5-10 points here.

100 freestyle

Projected finalists: Texas: 2/0, Cal: 1/1, Indiana: 0/1

Jack Alexy has developed into one of the best sprint freestylers in the world, especially in international meets (e.g., Olympics, World Championships, etc.). However, he lacks the explosivity and power getting off the starting blocks and the walls to truly challenge Tennessee’s Jordan Crooks and Florida’s Josh Liendo in the swimming format with the most time spent underwater harnessing the momentum off the starts and turns. Alexy is still one of the best freestylers above water, and that alone should keep him in the running for third.

Bjorn Seeliger is a 4-time A finalist in this event, but he seems to be slightly off at this meet. Notably, the Cal coaches elected to anchor the medley relay with Destin Lasco despite Seeliger having the better 100 freestyle best time. If Seeliger gets into the top 8 and Matthew Jensen, Nans Mazellier, or Robin Hanson find themselves getting into the consolation finals, that’s an opportunity for Cal to make up 8-10 points on a Texas squad that features Chris Guiliano (currently seeded to score) and Luke Hobson (not currently seeded to score but has been electric in his events and should factor in here) in this event.

200 breaststroke

Projected finalists: Texas: 1/1, Cal: 1/1, Indiana: 3/1

Like it was in the 100 breaststroke, this could be Indiana’s chance to cut into the deficit. They have 4 swimmers currently slated to score, but their highest seeded swimmer, Brian Benzing, has scored in this event previously. The Hoosiers need to score 50+ points here to make this one of the closest three-way team battles in recent NCAA swimming history.

Yamato Okadome has been sensational as a freshman in both breaststroke events throughout the year. Based on his performance thus far this week, there’s no reason to believe he can’t continue to perform, so he figures to be a contender for a top-five finish. If Cal wants to stand a chance of eclipsing Texas’ lead, Hank Rivers must score in the consolation final, at the very least. He will likely have to find a way to beat Texas’ Nate Germonprez and Will Schlotz, both of whom are seeded ahead of him currently.

200 butterfly

Projected finalists: Texas: 0/1, Cal: 1/1, Indiana: 0/1

Dare Rose dropped almost 1s in the 100 butterfly, but he’s historically been better in the 200 butterfly at the NCAA level. It seems like a lot of his improvements come from more effective underwater off the turns, which could bode well for this swim. Cal’s other entrant is Frank Applebaum, who previously swam in Division III. He dropped a big personal best to qualify for this championship in a time trial last month, and if he can replicate it, he’ll easily score more points. Texas and Indiana don’t currently have any swimmers seeded to score, but Texas has 4 entrants that are within 1.5 seconds of the 16th seed, and Indiana’s lone swimmer in this event was an A-finalist last year.

Platform Diving

Projected finalists: Texas: 0/1, Cal: 0/2, Indiana: 3/0

Indiana’s 3 finalists in the 3-meter diving event all finished in the top 8 of this event in last year’s NCAA Championships. That figures to be another 50 points for the Hoosiers. Meanwhile, Cal returns two scorers in this event from last year while Texas returns zero scorers. However, given that the Longhorns have scored in the two other diving events this week, they figure to have one of their two divers find their way into scoring position here.

400 freestyle relay

Before this relay, that amounts to Texas: 6/4, Cal: 7/6, Indiana: 8/3. By rough estimates, Cal could outscore Texas by 25-30 points while Indiana could outscore Texas by 30-35 points. While relay events offer double the points, Cal would still need to outscore Texas by at least 10 places (barring disqualifications) to win the overall trophy and probably need to just beat Indiana in this relay to secure a top-two finish for the 15th straight year. Cal must find 15-20 points elsewhere throughout the day (by getting extra scorers into either finals) to give them a chance. Alexy, Seeliger, and Lasco should be on this relay and have split under 41 seconds before. But, they have options for the 4th leg. Presumably, it’s Matthew Jensen who has swam alongside the aforementioned trio in the last 2 NCAA Championships. Tennessee has been otherworldly in the sprint freestyle, so it’s unlikely that Cal can challenge their throne in this relay.