At one point during the 2019-2020 swimming season, Billy Cruz was tied as the fastest collegiate 50 freestyler in the country. And now, he’ll take that sprint speed to the famous sprint pool of the Uytengsu Swim Center at the University of Southern California.
Cruz announced late Sunday evening that he would be transferring from Iowa Central Community College in Fort Dodge, Iowa to USC, where he’s planning to arrive in January 2021. This makes Cruz the first public commitment to USC since announcing the hiring of new head coach Jeremy Kipp last week.
Prior to college, Cruz represented the Mexican National Team, but lived in Montreal, Canada. He matriculated to Iowa Central, a two-year community college that is part of the NJCAA. The NJCAA athletics system is designed for a stepping stone, sometimes athletically and sometimes academically, for swimmers to progress to four-year NCAA or NAIA institutions. The 2019-2020 season was Cruz’s first at Iowa Central.
At the NJCAA National Championship meet, one of only two collegiate national championship meets that were able to complete prior COVID-19-caused cancellations sweeping through the sport, Cruz led Iowa Central to a 3rd-place team finish. That included wins in the 50 free, 100 free, 100 fly, and a runner-up finish in the 100 breaststroke. His results were among the most successful meets in recent memory for a non-Indian River swimmer at the NJCAA level, and included 2 Iowa Central relay wins.
Cruz’s Best Times:
| LCM | SCY | |
| 50 Free | 23.05 | 19.1 |
| 100 Free | 50.65 | 43.33 |
| 200 Free | 1:52.34 | 1:39.40 |
| 100 Back | 57.49 | 50.29 |
| 100 Breast | 1:05.27 | 54.44 |
| 100 Fly | 54.67 | 47.39 |
| 200 IM | 2:09.12 | 1:52.76 |
The USC men are badly in need of building the base and depth of their team moving forward, and Cruz will join an incoming class for the 2020-2021 season that does that in a big way. Including the 13th-ranked recruit in the class of 2020 Ben Dillard, USC will bring in at least 7 swimmers in addition to Cruz next season.
While Cruz’s 50 freestyle time (and his 42.9 100 free relay split) are the standout results, he brings some versatility to USC’s lineup as well.
The Trojans finished 6th out of 6 teams at last year’s Pac-12 Championship meet. That includes a last-place 200 free relay, albeit a relay that is scheduled to return all 4 legs next season.
Incoming 2020-2021 Swimmers
| Rank | Name | Home State | School (or Club if non-US) |
| B-13 | Ben Dillard | CA | Oak Ridge High School |
| B-botr | Danny Syrkin | CA | La Canada High School |
| Holden Raffin | IN | Munster High School | |
| Hugh Svendsen | NC | Myers Park High School | |
| Ryan Abdollahi | CA | Dana Hills High School | |
| B-botr | Scott Sobolewski | OH | St. Xavier High School |
| Vaggelis Makrygiannis | Greece | Anoargyr |
Billy decided the winter in Southern California might be more comfortable than Iowa/Minnesota areas.
He has 1-1 1/2 years of eligibility left max. Great athlete, seen him race many times!
How do you know this? 1 to 1.5 years? It looks like he swam 1 year at Iowa Central so he should have 3 years left of eligibility.
What happened to minnesota
Usc??
Nice pickup for Kipp in landing a potential D1 Championships scorer just a week after officially being announced as the new Men’s and Women’s HC for the Trojans. Getting a quick success and hopefully building more recruiting momentum on it. The US high school class of 2020 will be graduating soon and have already signed LOI’s for the upcoming 2020-21 school year, so Kipp will have to focus on the class of 2021 recruits. Based on his first year success at Northwestern, I suspect Kipp will be hitting the European junior circuit like he did in bringing in Burdisso, Bobar and Brunzell. And there’s the transfer portal where current D1 elite might be thinking about coming out west.
There are some great pickups from schools that shut down their programs too. These athletes may want to continue swimming and transfer.
Tremendous versatility across the strokes. The 200IM is obviously not part of his championship program, so it’s probably a midseason time, but it’s still way, way less than the sum of its parts.
The NAIA also completed their national championships
You’re right.
He has three years of eligibility, correct?