2026 NCAA Division I Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships
- Wednesday, March 18 – Saturday, March 21, 2026
- McAuley Aquatic Center, Atlanta, GA
- Defending Champions: Virginia (5x)
- Championship Central
- Preview Index
- Psych Sheet
- Live Stream
- Live Results
- Live Recaps
Day 2 prelims just concluded in Atlanta, which means it’s time to overreact.
Not Enough Prelims Best Times
My initial takeaway from this morning is that the elimination of the ‘B’ finals didn’t lead to faster swims in prelims. Now, to be clear, the time to make the ‘A’ final was faster than last year in all 4 events, but that wasn’t unexpected, since college swimming as a whole is faster this year.
What I mean by the prelims swims weren’t faster is that the majority of swimmers who made it to finals added time this morning. With only 8 swimmers advancing to finals, we were thinking we might see more prelims best times than usual, but that was not the case.
The 100 fly is the best example of this. Only 1 of the 8 finals qualifiers dropped time this morning. Coincidentally, it was the 8th place finisher, Cal’s Annie Jia, who dropped 0.06 seconds from her seed time. Of note, Indiana’s Alex Shackell didn’t drop time in the 100 fly this morning, but she did tie her season best of 49.95, so it wasn’t an add either.
In the 400 IM, only 3 of the finals qualifiers dropped time this morning, which was the same as the 200 free. The 100 breast bucked this trend, as 5 of the 8 finalists dropped time this morning, including all 4 swimmers 5th-8th, which is significant because those drops directly led to their qualifying for finals at all.
This effect bled into the relays as well, even though those are timed finals. Still, the teams that swam this morning largely added from their seeds. Of the 19 200 free relay teams that swam this morning, only 3 dropped from their seed, while Arizona tied their seed.
No “Statement” Swims
Another thing that stuck out this morning was that no one threw down a really nasty time this morning. There were great swims this morning to be sure, like McKenzie Siroky‘s 56.93 100 breast and Ella Jansen‘s 4:00.24 400 IM, but nothing really special happened. Last year, we had Gretchen Walsh go for it in prelims and put up a 47.21 100 fly, which was an NCAA Record at the time.
Virginia Doesn’t Look As Good As Usual
Bold to say, I know, but Virginia just didn’t seem that impressive this morning. They have the most finalists tonight, 6, which goes without saying is great, but they were also projected to have 6 finalists today. Also, 5 of their 6 finalists added time this morning.
This is, of course, an example of Virginia being a victim of their own success. They have the most finalists and, barring a shocking disaster tonight, they’ll expand their lead over the field today. My point is simply that Virginia came into this meet as a very dominant favorite, seeded to win by something like 200 points, and even though they’re leading, it just doesn’t feel that dominant right now.
I agree with the ultimate goal of these format changes is to increase the spectator experience which can lead to television contracts, but this is a disaster. I compare this to an unedited, first draft of a thesis paper. Why would the television experience include a stationary camera set up in the jet stream, with warped picture? Just slop. I would challenge the committee to remove themselves from any live experience at this event and watch the remainder of the meet through the network coverage.
Dominance is backing up your ranking coming in, which is what Virginia did this morning.
They were projected to have one top 8 100 flyer and one between 9-16. They went one and two.
They were projected to have two top 8, and two 9-16s in the 400 IM. They went two and one.
In the 200 free, they were expected to go 2/1. They went 2/1.
In the 100 breast, 1/0, but went 1/1.
So the expectation was 6 A scorers and 4 B scorers. They went 6/5.
The only swimmers not to score who swam today — Virginia sent 13 women to the blocks — were Umstead and Hartman. But they got… Read more »
why are you bringing facts to a feelings and vibes party?
I’ve watched every swim race at both men’s and women’s ncaa championships, usually live in prelims and on delay when I get back home from workout for finals, for about as long as I can remember, probably as long as they’ve been stream-able.
I didn’t yesterday, OR this morning. I will be attending in person on friday/saturday, to watch a former swimmer compete in her last races, but I will be deeply sad if, after two years of scoring and swimming at night, she’s just a morninig swim in her final meet.
So in their never-ending quest to get my sports fanatic uncles to tune in, (they have never, and will never), they’ve lost me…
Hulk No Smash.
My thoughts
Food for Thought
2026 Women’s NCAA Championships
First congratulate Carmen @carmen_weiler_ and our relay for swimming well this morning
Second and Food for Thought about Finals at NCAA’s. I know in my last post I would not talk about it but I can’t help myself.
I think that ig you don’t have a swimmer or a relay you should not come back to Finals and leave the pool deck empty and the stands empty.
I love FAST swimming and I always watch every race because I appreciate swimming and always trying to learn from competition.
This week and next week unless I have a swimmer/s or relay competing of one of my swimmers wants to come… Read more »
When they eliminated the B finals to make the evening session quicker or more exciting or whatever, did they not realize the coaches would want the same wait time in between events? Was this seriously not considered? Because there is no way this is a better audience experience. No way.
It should have been. I wrote about it at least six times on various platforms.
I think we’re just seeing a bunch of swimmers having trouble performing their best in the morning, which means that fans aren’t getting to see the best that these athletes have to offer. I hate that this new format is demonstrably preventing us from seeing swimmers peak.
Take, for example, Sara Curtis and Eva Okaro in the 100 fly. Both added significant amounts of time from their seeds. If we had B-finals, we would get to at least see Sara Curtis get a second shot. The same goes for more than half of the swimmers ranked 9-16 in the 400IM, 7 out of the 8 (!!!) swimmers ranked 9-16 in the 200 free (notably Gemmell, Dobson, Nesty, and Balduccini adding… Read more »
I didn’t expect prelims to be faster just due to the lack of B-finals. Last year you still had to go all out to make it back, it’s no different this year – no matter if you get a 2nd swim or not.
The level is so high that it is only a very few that can lift the foot from the gas just a little and still get in the A final. No one would do that in the past to save up for a big B-final swim – they would still go for the A.
Not sure I agree with your analysis until I see another data point. The one data point we have is the time to make the A final and the 16th fastest time. In only one case (16th fastest time in the 100 Breast) was the time slower this year than last year. In some cases, the times were much faster. Of course it could be the case that things are just generally faster. I personally don’t buy it but it could be the case. The metric you used to argue things aren’t faster are the number of best time (or lack of) in the events. I woudl want as a comparison what they looked like last year in prelims in… Read more »