We are less than a week away from the start of September, and after months of major international meets, we are ready to return to NCAA Swimming & Diving with the start of the 2025-2026 season just around the corner. The 2025 recruits, and transfers, have made their decisions for where they will spend their year and will be starting classes over the next month.
At SwimSwam, the smell of college swimming in the air means that we have been working through the top recruits, the top recruiting classes and last season’s top 12 programs for both genders. As we post articles, we will update our compendium (as Mark coined it last year) so you can quickly and easily access everything.
Top 12 Programs Preview
| Women’s Top 12 | Men’s Top 12 | |||||
| Program | 2025 NCAA Score | Stars (★) | Program | 2025 NCAA Score | Stars (★) | |
| Virginia | 544 | 31.5 | 1 | Texas | 490 | |
| Stanford | 417 | 28 | 2 | California | 471 | |
| Texas | 394 | 27 | 3 | Indiana | 459 | 26.5 |
| Indiana | 312 | 25.5 | 4 | Florida | 315 | 27 |
| Tennessee | 298 | 23.5 | 5 | Tennessee | 266.5 | 18.5 |
| Florida | 232 | 20.5 | 6 | Arizona State | 248 | 21 |
| Louisville | 209.5 | 22.5 | 7 | Georgia | 238.5 | 19 |
| California | 202.5 | 25.5 | 8 | Stanford | 216 | 16 |
| Michigan | 196 | 26.5 | 9 | NC State | 178 | 21 |
| NC State | 164 | 23 | 10 | Virginia Tech | 107.5 | 11 |
| Southern California | 130 | 19 | 11 | Michigan | 98.5 | 23 |
| Wisconsin | 126 | 12.5 | 12 | Texas A&M | 95.5 | 15 |
GRADING CRITERIA
Over the years, we’ve gone back and forth on how to project points, ranging from largely subjective rankings to more data-based grading criteria based on ‘projected returning points.’ We like being as objective as possible, but we’re going to stick with the approach we’ve adopted post-Covid. The “stars” will rely heavily on what swimmers actually did last year, but we’ll also give credit to returning swimmers or freshmen who have posted times that would have scored last year.
Since we only profile the top 12 teams in this format, our grades are designed with that range in mind. In the grand scheme of college swimming and compared to all other college programs, top 12 NCAA programs would pretty much all grade well across the board. But in the interest of making these previews informative, our grading scale is tough – designed to show the tiers between the good stroke groups, the great ones, and the 2015 Texas fly group types.
- 5 star (★★★★★) – a rare, elite NCAA group projected to score 25+ points per event
- 4 star (★★★★) – a very, very good NCAA group projected to score 15-24 points per event
- 3 star (★★★) – a good NCAA group projected to score 5-14 points per event
- 2 star (★★) – a solid NCAA group projected to score 1-4 points per event
- 1 star (★) – an NCAA group that is projected to score no points per event, though that doesn’t mean it’s without potential scorers – they’ll just need to leapfrog some swimmers ahead of them to do it
We’ll grade each event discipline: sprint free (which we define to include all the relay-distance freestyle events, so 50, 100 and 200), distance free, IM, breaststroke, backstroke, butterfly and diving. Use these grades as a jumping-off point for discussion, rather than a reason to be angry.
Also, keep in mind that we are publishing many of these previews before teams have posted finalized rosters. We’re making our assessments based on the best information we have available at the time of publication, but we reserve the right to make changes after publication based on any new information that may emerge regarding rosters. If that does happen, we’ll make certain to note the change.
Top Recruiting Classes
| Women’s Programs | Men’s Programs | |
| Cal, Stanford, Virginia, Florida | 1-4 | Virginia, Indiana, Texas, Florida |
| Texas, NC State, Indiana, Georgia | 5-8 | Cal, Stanford, Arizona State, NC State |
| Tennessee, Princeton, USC, Michigan | 9-12 | Auburn, Tennessee, Georgia, Notre Dame |
| Louisville, Ohio State, Duke, Notre Dame | 13-16 | Princeton, Navy, Harvard, Michigan |
| UCLA, Wisconsin, South Carolina | Honorable Mentions (in no particular order) | Wisconsin, Louisville, Texas A&M, Ohio State |
A few important notes on our rankings:
- The rankings listed are based on our Class of 2025 Re-Rank. “HM” refers to our honorable mentions and “BOTR” refers to our Best of the Rest section for top-tier recruits.
- Like most of our rankings, these placements are subjective. We base our team ranks on a number of factors: prospects’ incoming times are by far the main factor, but we also consider potential upside in the class, class size, relay impact, and team needs. Greater weight is placed on known success in short course yards, so foreign swimmers are slightly devalued based on the difficulty in converting long course times to short course production.
- Transfers are included, though they are weighed less than recruits who arrive with four seasons of eligibility.
- For the full list of all verbally committed athletes, click here. A big thank you to SwimSwam’s own Anne Lepesant for compiling that index – without it, rankings like these would be far less comprehensive.
- Some teams had not released a finalized 2025-26 team roster at the time these articles were published, meaning it’s possible we missed some names. Let us know in the comments below.
Individual Recruit Ranks
Girls
- Ranks As Seniors (June 2025)
- Ranks As Juniors (from July 2024)
- Ranks As Sophomores (from April 2023)
Boys
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I took the top ten teams from NCAAs for women this past year, and I found the top splits/times of all the people on their roster. Then I added up their potential relays using people on all the fastest relays rather than in NCAA (4 relay limit). This can give an idea of which teams will prioritize which relays because they are stronger in them. Using my methods, Virginia will have the best relays overall, and then Stanford. Florida is really in trouble from a relay perspective, even if not individually. If people are interested in seeing more of my numbers I can share them.
I’d be interested in this data.
I am trying to figure out how to embed a picture/file in the comments for this purpose but I cannot. Anyone know how?
Stanford is extremely interesting without Meehan. The Choke God…. All Hail…. 🙌
Did u forget they placed 2nd at NCAA’s?
Thankful that SwimSwam recognizes NCAA Swimming Championship is the most exciting competition of any in the aquatic realm.
While the Olympics are OK, World Championships fair, Pan Pacs yawn and Pan Ams oh so boring – The fastest scy venue brings out exciting surges of emotion for all humans.
Please give us more stories on NCAA competitions – When will the world catch up and start building scy pools?
Just curious. Why start at #12? Maybe this tracks to prior years, but it seem like an odd position to start. Top 10, 16, even 25 are more logical and customary. Was it so SS could talk about A&M? Not a criticism. Just an observation.
In any case, this will be an interesting year to see how the impacts from last year’s roster debacle through early cuts, transfers, and recruiting shake ups impacts teams on and off this list. Shifts in talents will make for an interesting year and a lot of ammo for debates through out the year. Could be a fun one to watch.
Well, 12 is customary because we’ve been doing that since we started doing these in maybe 2013.
It’s historically where there has been a pretty significant break between tiers of teams. It’s not the same every year, and we’ll go back after and look for lower ranked teams that seem like they could make the leap.
Could have to do with the NCAA allowing the top twelve teams preferred lottery seating selection on deck. This was done to alleviate the surges of bravado and tomfoolery of teams taping their name in areas, having managers hide overnight in pool areas in order to get the prime spot or staff members bull rushing the pool area to secure team seating when the doors first opened on Day 1…Darn NCAA took some of the fun out of it. But civilization and order tends to reign once in a while.
I thought the ACC had roster limits of 22. Am I right or is that just the SEC?
NC State’s roster at their website lists 28 men and 27 women for their 2025-26 roster
I tried to look up the same information via the net for Cal (ACC), but their updated information is 2 years old; I’m sure you have current information. Could you share?
just the SEC. ACC is around 30ish iirc.
Combined scoring – inspired by your conveniently side-by-side tables – shows Indiana as #2 overall program.
Forever grateful for Mark expanding my vernacular with the word compendium in my conversations!
One can only make worthy use of the word ‘compendium’ if the information assembled is of interest.