2019 SEC Swimming & Diving Championships: Day 2 Up/Down/Mids

2019 SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE SWIMMING & DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS

• Tuesday, February 19 – Saturday, February 23
• Gabrielsen Natatorium, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia (Eastern Time Zone)
• Defending Champion: Texas A&M Women (3x), Florida men (6x)(results)
• Live results
• Live Video – SEC Network
• Championship Central

For those unfamiliar with swimming terminology, the concept of “Ups” and “Downs” is a good way to track which teams performed best at prelims. In prelims, swimmers qualify for one of three finals heats: the top 8 finishers make the A final, places 9 through 16 the B final and places 17 through 24 the C final. In finals, swimmers are locked into their respective final, meaning a swimmer in the B heat (spots 9-16) can only place as high as 9th or as low as 16th, even if they put up the fastest or slowest time of any heat in the final.

With that in mind, we’ll be tracking “Ups,” “Mids” and “Downs” after each prelims session. “Up” refers to swimmers in the A final, “Mid” to swimmers in the B final and “Down” to swimmers in the C final.

One of the early emerging stories in this 2019 SEC Championships has been the strength we’ve seen from the Missouri men. Their big event was the 200 IM, where they have three men into the A final, while they also have two into the 50 free A final and three into the 500 free B final. Mizzou is a team that typically rests less for the SEC Champs and focuses on NCAAs, as we’ve seen under Greg Rhodenbaugh, but he’s been out on administrative leave most of the season while a Title IX investigation has been underway, and interim Andy Grevers has the men swimming lights out so far.

Meanwhile, it’s clear that the Texas A&M men have been struggling a bit. The talent is there, and freshman Shaine Casas and sophomore transfer Mark Theall look solid, but they haven’t been hitting or much faster than their seed times thus far in the meet. This is a young team, so adjusting to the pressure, and coaches learning the athletes’ tapers, will contribute to a learning curve here.

The Georgia men’s sprint group has shown how thin it is, and while their distance and IM groups are chugging along as expected, they had nobody under 20 seconds in the 50 free and won’t have any sprinters in the final tonight.

Up/Mid/Downs

Note: Diving doesn’t actually have B and C finals, those spots are decided based on prelims. But, we’ve grouped them into downs and mids anyway, just for consistency.

Men:

Women: