Big Ten Championship Central, Including Live and Full Results
200 yard freestyle relay
The Wisconsin Badgers’ title hopes took a huge hit before they even left the ground on the second of four days at the Big Ten Championships. The Badgers’ best swimmer, Maggie Meyer, had one of only two sub-22 split of the entire field, but unfortunately negated it by leaving .05 seconds early. Her teammate Rebecka Palm, who had the second-best mark in 21.84, also will have that wiped off the books, though she had a near-perfect start. The Badgers will really be kicking themselves after this one, because with legal starts, they still would have won the race by over as second.
As it was, the Michigan Wolverines, who were amazingly consistent with every split falling between a 22.32 and a 22.38, took advantage to pick up big relay points with a win in 1:29.44. Penn State was just behind in 1:29.64, and Purdue was third in 1:29.70.
Amongst the two remaining contenders, Indiana was in fourth at 1:30.14, which is about where they expected to be in this relay, and Minnesota was fifth in 1:30.21, which was a positive result for them.
500 yard freestyle
Minnesota’s Ashley Steenvorden nearly two seconds off of her career best time to win the women’s 500 free in an A-cut time of 4:37.66. This win, which ended up being pretty sizable, didn’t look like it would happen until she took off on the final 100, in which she was 8 tenths faster than third-place swimmer Jessica White from Indiana (4:39.57) and more than two seconds better than runner-up Brittany Strumbel (4:39.14) who seemed to have the race sealed up through 400 yards.
This was an important race for both the Gophers and the Hoosiers, who both see this as a strength. Minnesota outscored Indiana on the race, but just barely, and Wisconsin did themselves no favors after the earlier DQ with just three points earned. Indiana and Minnesota really distanced themselves from the rest of the field with this race.
200 yard IM
Indiana’s Allysa Vavra and Ashley Jones finished first and second in the women’s 200 IM in very good times of 1:57.01 and 1:57.64, respectively. This race was won on the breaststroke, which upon initial reflection seems odd based on their splits (33.6 for Vavra, 34.8 for Jones). But both swimmers looked incredibly efficient in their breaststroke, which set them up to pull away from the field on the freestyle leg.
Ohio State’s Angela Severn was third in 1:58.54, followed by Minnesota’s two elite breaststrokers in their “other” event. Haley Spencer was fourth in 1:58.73 and Jillian Tyler was fifth in 1:59.30. Wisconsin, with only4 points from a 13th place finish, was already more than 100 points out of the lead at this point, though their strength comes in the 100-yard events that Day 3 is heavily populated with. Indiana made the first strong move of the meet in this event to separate themselves from their opponents with 50 big event points.
50 yard freestyle
Wisconsin took advantage of their first A-final, Beckie Thompson, with a big victory in 22.22, just outtouching MIchigan’s Natasha Moodie, who finished stroke-for-stroke with Thompson in 22.26. Ohio State’s Megan Detro had an impressive freshman time, in a typically senior-heavy race, of 22.35 for third.
Though the win was nice for the Badgers, and with Indiana failing to get a swimmer into an A-final, Wisconsin was only able to get a single swimmer into the top eight and thus couldn’t make up much ground on anyone. The Badgers only moved up to seventh after this event. It will be interesting to see what Maggie Meyer’s third individual event will be, besides the backstrokes, as she would’ve been the favorite to win this event.
1-meter diving
Minnesota’s Kelci Bryant continued her crusade for a second-straight Big Ten Diver of the Year award with a commanding victory on the 1-meter with a score of 370.3. This was nearly 30 points better than her score from last year, which bodes well for her to repeat at NCAA’s. This win was not unexpected for the Gophers, but Indiana has the better overall program, and scored a total of six divers, including 4 A-finalists. Laura Ryan from Indiana was second with 341.5 and Iowa’s Deidre Freedman was third. With those points, Indiana was able to extend their league at the end of the second day.
Scores After Day 2
1. Indiana 279
2. Minnesota 236
3. Ohio State 149
4. Michigan 147
5. Purdue 146.5
6. Penn State 143
7. Wisconsin 99.5
8. Iowa 75
9. Northwestern 74
10. Michigan State 53
11. University of Illinois 46
