The Collegiate Swimming & Diving Coaches Association of America (CSCAA) has sent a survey to its membership to inform the future of the sport.
After criticisms that certain groups of coaches were excluded from the decision-making process that led to the changes in NCAA Championship format and selection last season, the CSCAA is encouraging all coaches to participate in the survey.
“Please submit your response so your perspective is reflected in the collective voice of the CSCAA membership,” the survey reads.
The objective of these changes is to increase the value and exposure of the NCAA Swimming and Diving Championship, and in turn, the sport as a whole. The initial changes, made to accommodate broadcast needs and pursue linear coverage, are now being evaluated after their first year of implementation. Please provide feedback on the 2026 NCAA Championship changes. Your responses will help shape the CSCAA’s report to the NCAA and guide future championship planning.
Coaches had the opportunity to respond to each question on a scale of 1 (Strongly Disagree/Very Unsupportive) to 5 (Strongly Agree/Very supportive).
The questions from the survey are below, starting with a reflection on the 2026 championships and then moving into considerations for future championships and recruiting reform.
Responses were due by April 3.
The CSCAA is not the final decision maker on these topics, but the NCAA’s newest governance structure gives coaching organizations like the CSCAA an increased voice in decision making.
2026 Championship Review
B Finals
- After experiencing the 2026 NCAA Championship, I support reinstating B Finals in the NCAA Championship program.
- From a high-performance and team management perspective, conducting B Finals immediately before the start of the evening finals session is workable.
- I would not support reinstating B Finals if they are conducted prior to the televised finals session.
- Please provide any additional feedback related to B Finals.
NCAA Relays
- My institution had relay(s) competing at the 2026 NCAA Championship meet.
- After experiencing the 2026 NCAA Championship, I am satisfied with the relay format used at the championship meet.
- After experiencing the 2026 NCAA Championship, I believe all relays should be conducted in the same session.
- Relays at the NCAA Championship meet should be competed in a prelim/final format, excluding the 800 freestyle relay.
- Please provide any additional feedback related to relays at the NCAA Championship meet.
Diving Format
- My institution had divers competing at the 2026 NCAA Championship.
- After experiencing the 2026 NCAA Championship, I believe the diving events were conducted in a format that supported competitive success.
- The diving finals format used at the 2026 NCAA Championship meet (3 dives, break, 3 dives) was a positive experience for the athletes from my institution who attended the meet.
- Diving finals at the NCAA Championship meet took an appropriate amount of time.
- Please provide any additional feedback related to diving at the NCAA Championship meet.
Conference Qualifiers/NCAA Selection Process
Editorial: The separate questions for the men’s and women’s championships here is because there has been discussion that the men’s and women’s AQ cut line shouldn’t be in the same spot as a result of different field sizes. AQs took up a larger percentage of men’s spots than women’s spot, and usually would under the current system.
- I understand how the conference qualifier process works and the rationale behind this change.
- I understand the overall NCAA Selection Process.
- Generally, I support providing multiple pathways to qualify for the NCAA Championship, including conference qualifiers.
- The conference qualifier selections for the women’s 2026 NCAA Championship were appropriate in scale.
- The conference qualifier selections for the men’s 2026 NCAA Championship were appropriate in scale.
- Please provide any additional feedback related to conference qualifiers.
Additional 2026 Changes
- Wednesday (200 Medley Relay, 1,650 Freestyle, 800 Freestyle Relay) can be conducted in one time-final session in the evening.
- I was aware of the 2026 Championship changes when they were adopted by the NCAA in September 2025?
Future Championships
Over time, the CSCAA has gathered recommendations from Division I coaches regarding the future of the NCAA Championship. The most frequently recurring recommendations are listed below.
Please indicate your level of support for the CSCAA to explore each of these recommendations as potential future considerations for Division I swimming and diving.
Large Scale NCAA Championship or Season Changes
- I support exploring the addition of 50-yard stroke events to the NCAA Championship event lineup.
- I support exploring the addition of team diving to the NCAA Championship event lineup.
- I support exploring reduced roster sizes for the NCAA Championships.
- I support exploring an expanded scoring format, such as scoring through 24th place, revised relay scoring, or another alternative.
- I support exploring a combined championship format in which men and women compete at the same location at the same time.
- I support exploring a combined men and women’s championship format in which diving is contested first and swimming second (for example, diving on days 1–3 and swimming on days 3–6).
- I support exploring a season that does not straddle the winter break/semester break?
- I support providing NCAA Championship access to student-athletes who lose qualifying positions during the selection process due to conference qualifiers.
- I support exploring a complete separation of swimming and diving, in which swimming and diving championships are earned and celebrated independently.
- I support exploring an alternative to Zones as a method for qualifying divers to the NCAA Championships.
- I support exploring the removal of last chance meets from the championship qualification process.
- Please provide any additional comments.
NCAA Division I Swimming & Diving Recruiting Reform
Please indicate your level of support for the CSCAA to explore recruiting reform in each of the three key areas below.
- I would be supportive of exploring a later start date for the start of the recruiting process.
- I would support exploring changes to the recruiting calendar, including revisions to current shutdowns and dead periods.
- I would support exploring alternative transfer window dates to replace the current window.
Make the meet SCM! For God’s sake we need to get rid of yards and be part of the rest of the world. Imagine is college track still ran on 400 yard tracks?
Here’s a fun article from 1975 about the NCAA track & field switch: https://www.nytimes.com/1975/07/13/archives/metric-track-new-problem-for-coaches.html
It’s a tricky moment for swimming. There is a real cost to swapping over, and ADs have used much lesser issues with pools as an excuse to cut teams. Regardless of philosophy, I think making the switch at this moment could be disastrous because of logistics.
As fun as the idea sounds, I’m with Braden. This would probably just result in programs being cut because no admin wants to widen the pools to be 25m or add in bulkheads that didn’t exist before. Not to mention the teams that only have 25yd pools to train in. Even if you let regular-season meets stick to yards, it would mean that programs that can’t adapt to 25m would be disadvantaged by the extra distance and admins would ask themselves why they’re keeping a non-competitive program facilities wise.
Does ESPN receive the survey? If so, how much influence do their responses have on any resulting changes?
Just put the B finals back where they belong…
And don’t forget the relays too! Those ALL need to be in the evening.
Relays should be prelim/final
My swimmer disagrees. He said that would be exhausting
Honestly I’m personally not against adding 50s of stroke in but I’d wanna see 2 other things happen first:
1. The 100 IM is an event in SCM and I’ve heard multiple swimmers over the past few weeks say they wished that would have been an event championship at NCAAs. This should rly be considered before the 50s of stroke.
2. How successfully engaging the 50s of stroke are at the Olympics in 2028. If they truly are as engaging as some hope they are then I wouldn’t mind seeing them but that does depend on the Olympic success first.
why 100 IM before 50s?
I’d also vote for 100 IM before 50s, feels like they’re overall at least a bit more likely to be exciting.
I remember when MA won the 100 IM at SC Worlds in 2016 and people were like “Nah that’s not a real event”…
“I would not support reinstating B Finals if they are conducted prior to the televised finals session“
Interesting way to suggest this is the only avenue for B finals to come back. But why?
What is the primary product? The live event or the replay? Genuinely wondering.
Because if it’s the replay then you could run B finals and ESPN would just skip them and stitch together a packaged replay of the A finals. And then if that’s the case you should add C finals too. Let the kids swim.
Yeah, TV can run ads while the B final takes place
Still not input from the athletes?
Never has been…
Ah yes, the option to support reducing roster sizes. Cant wait for nobody to vote for it but for them to cut roster sizes next year because “the membership said so”
50 stroke events are… interesting but I would rather the 1000 or 100 IM instead but ok I guess
Combining the genders into one meet? no way only took like 60 years