How Has the New Day 3 Event Lineup Affected Swimmers at 2025 Women’s NCAAs?

2025 NCAA Division I Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships

• March 19-22, 2025
• Weyerhaeuser King County Aquatics Center – Federal Way, Washington
• Short Course Yards (25 yards)
• Start Times: Prelims: 10 AM ׀ Finals: 6 PM (Pacific Daylight Time)
• Meet Central
• Official Psych Sheets
• SwimSwam Preview Index
• Live Results
• Live Stream
• Live Recaps :Day 1 ׀ Day 2 ׀ Day 3

You would have been forgiven had you yelled at your ESPN screen this morning in prelims, “Wrong event!” Although the 2025 NCAA Division I Women’s Psych Sheet listed the 400 IM as the first event of the day, it was in fact the butterflyers who kicked off the heats.

At their April 2024 meeting, the NCAA Division I Men’s and Women’s Swimming & Diving Committee discussed, among other things, a proposal to change the NCAA Championship event schedule, swapping the order of the 400 IM and 100 fly on Day 3. As we reported when the notes from this meeting were released, the pretense for the change was that the 100 fly/100 back double is by far the most common same-day double in collegiate swimming, and moving those events further apart would make that double more plausible.

The proposal was eventually approved and the 2025 NCAA Division I Championships are the first to feature the 100 fly preceding the 400 IM on Day 3.

We wondered if this might encourage more swimmers to double up with the extra 23 minutes between the 100 fly and the 100 back. Here is what we found.

16 swimmers were slated to swim the 100 fly and a second event (either the 100 back or 100 breast) on Day 3 at the 2024 NCAA Women’s Championships, but only six of them (Olivia Bray of Texas, Miranda Grana from Texas A&M, USC’s Caroline Famous, Alabama’s Gabrielle Van Brunt, Morgan Kraus from Ohio State, and UVA’s Carly Novelline) swam in both their events. Florida’s Olivia Peoples dropped the 100 breast after competing in the 100 fly in prelims. Auburn’s Meghan Lee and Florida State’s Jenny Halden swam in prelims of the 100 fly but scratched the 100 back. The rest either scratched the 100 fly to focus on the 100 breast (Joleigh Crye of Cincinnati) or the 100 back (SIU’s Celia Pulido, Mackenzie McConagha of Wisconsin, Alex Roberts from San Diego State, and Auburn’s Ellie Waldrup).

A year later, 17 swimmers were on the psych sheet with two events. This year no one attempted the fly/breast combination but seven swimmers doubled up with the fly/back: Bray, Famous, Novelline, and Grana, as well as Leah Shackley (NC State), Erika Pelaez (NC State), and Mackenzie McConagha (Wisconsin). It is interesting to note that McConagha scratched the 100 fly last year to focus on the back but chose to compete in both events this year. Peoples swam the fly this year and scratched the breast. Abigail Arens of Texas did the same thing. They both made the A final in the fly. Cincinnati’s Crye focused on the breast, as she had last year. Lora Komoroczy of Auburn, SIU’s Pulido, Nyah Funderburke from Ohio State, and Zoe Carlos-Broc of LSU opted for the backstroke only. Scarlett Ferris of Nevada did not swim in either event.

2025 NCAA Women’s Championships

2024 NCAA Women’s Championships

While it might be premature to draw any sweeping conclusions from the first championships with the new schedule, it is reasonable to assume that those 23 minutes might make a difference in the way coaches and swimmers plan their championship meet lineup going forward.