From The Indy Pool Deck, 2013 Men’s NCAA Swimming and Diving Preview

For SwimSwam.com, Doug Boyd (swimfever.com), makes his 2013 Men’s NCAA Swimming and Diving predictions (video above).

Here are Braden Keith’s top five predictions:

1. Michigan Wolverines (Seeded Points: 510) – The Wolverine relays need to show up; they’re not fighting just Cal, they’re fighting some stiff challenges from the teams that will finish in the 4-8 range as a team. Dylan Bosch needs to score somewhere high; maybe not even as high as his crazy-good seeds. Just somewhere high. The Wolverines are on the high-end of a few ranges that see only a few tenths to slide many spots in either direction. The pressure is on them: they have a lot further to go down than they do to go up.

2. Cal Golden Bears (Seeded Points: 290) – For Cal to make up the ground and take the points, they need the guys who didn’t score at NCAA’s last year to do damage: Josh Prenot needs to score in three events, for example. They need to pick Michigan off in key events, like the 200 breaststroke where Josh Prenot and Trevor Hoyt are seeded just behind Michigan’s Richard Funk. Even that might not be enough. A lot of the difference between “seeded points” and “needed points” for Cal will have to be in the relays, and without Tyler Messerschmidt they’re down four vital swims out of the 20 they need to shift and shimy around to make the relays work.

3. Stanford Cardinal (Seeded Points: 183) – Stanford is the only team of these top five who will have any diving points coming at NCAA’s. That’s because they have qualified more divers (4) than any other team in the country for the meet except Indiana (who also has 4).

Now, nobody is pretending that four qualifiers will turn into 12 scores. Kristian Ipsen should be good for 50 points himself (remember that last year, when he was 10th on the platform, he dove conservatively to avoid injury prior to the Olympic Trials). If the other three guys combined can muster up another 20 combined the Cardinal will be happy. Beyond that, Stanford didn’t look nearly as rested at Pac-12′s as they have in the past. Aaron Wayne missed the A-Final at that meet in the 50 free, and he should be in the top 8 at NCAA’s. This Stanford roster continues to be one that has more depth than you realize until you start counting scorers. Their relays average seeds between 7th and 8th – that will be a key for the upward mobility of Stanford.

4. Texas Longhorns (Seeded Points: 151) – The Longhorns have two divers qualified for this meet: Will Chandler, who red-shirted last season, and Cory Bowesrsox, a freshman who was 7th on the 1-meter at the USA Diving National Championships in 2011. That will help in a year where the Longhorns’ swimming teams aren’t quite as they good for the last 5 years (where they never placed lower than 2nd). Dax Hill needs to have good relay swims for this team, and some of these sprinters like Charlie Moore and Tripp Cooper need to do something to get some points and become supporting stars for Hill. It looks like Clay Youngquist is back on freshman form, so he could be north of 40 individual points.

5. Florida Gators (Seeded Points: 299) – This Florida team, thanks to the return of Sebastien Rousseau and the addition of one of the country’s best freshmen Pavel Werner, doesn’t have a whole lot of holes left in its lineup. We won’t see a lot of points from them in the 100 back. The pressure is on deBorde to sneak a few out of the 100 (he’ll be great in the 50). But they make up for that in races like the 400 IM or the 200 fly, where 3+ A-finalists are easily a possibility. This is also a much more experienced team than last year. The Gators and Texas for 4-5 could flip-flop either way.

For the complete list of Braden Keith’s predictions, 1-25, see Braden’s report here. 

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don
11 years ago

I love Bottom’s philosophy of swimming to win all the time, every-time. He made no apologies when he said they needed to win their conference championship so they did what they needed to do to swim fast. He also said he realized some teams were beat up at their conference meets and did not have the same approach (i.e. they needed to win conference championships).
If you look at Michigan’s seed times last year at NCAA’s, there was not a lot of movement by most (not all) of their swimmers, so if that holds true this year, it is going to be a very close meet.
Roll you Bears!

David McClellan
11 years ago

I’ve been doing men’s predictions since 2005 and have refined a methodology that I think is pretty accurate, even I’m not following swimming as closely as most of the folks on this site throughout the year. As evidence, here’s the summary of how I did last year and the link to the post-mortem thread.

http://forum.collegeswimming.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=5640&start=600

2012 Men’s Predictions
1. Texas, 456
2. Zona, 433
3. Stanford, 431
4. Cal, 356
5. Michigan, 326
6. Auburn, 323
7. USC, 211
8. FLA, 161

And here are the actuals.

1. Cal, 535.5
2. Texas, 491
3. Stanford, 426.5
4. Arizona, 396
5. Michigan,… Read more »

bobo gigi
Reply to  David McClellan
11 years ago

You are the Nate Silver of swimming!

SwimFever
Reply to  David McClellan
10 years ago

Pretty good pics sir! Numbers beat instinct 😉

q
11 years ago

What is this powder you speak of??

SwimFever
Reply to  q
10 years ago

Q…Cal uses their own mix of recovery drinks. Most likely from Cytosport which I believe was founded by a Cal professor. IMO they make it a point to keep it secret from others. Even at times mixing it from unmarked containers at the meet. It is most likely a ploy to make theirs look better than others. Get inside the heads of competitors…A good psych routine? It does become a topic at times on the deck, so it def works if that is the intent. Whatever they do works! And after this morning’s session I still think they can pull off the “psych sheet upset” as Michigan opened the door a little.

John Smith
Reply to  SwimFever
10 years ago

secret powder?…. unmarked containers?

SwimFever
Reply to  John Smith
10 years ago

Correct, Mr. Smith. This year was the same, but Michigan was just better.

About Gold Medal Mel Stewart

Gold Medal Mel Stewart

MEL STEWART Jr., aka Gold Medal Mel, won three Olympic medals at the 1992 Olympic Games. Mel's best event was the 200 butterfly. He is a former World, American, and NCAA Record holder in the 200 butterfly. As a writer/producer and sports columnist, Mel has contributed to Yahoo Sports, Universal Sports, …

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