Northwestern v. Chicago
- January 10-11, 2026
- Ratner Athletics Center, Chicago, IL
- SCY (25 yards)
- Results
- Final Scores:
- Women- Northwestern: 247, Chicago: 45
- Men- Northwestern: 222, Chicago: 76
In a clash between two schools, separated by just over 20 miles, the Northwestern Wildcats handled business against the University of Chicago in the Maroons’ home water. The Wildcat women overwhelmed Chicago 247-45, while the Northwestern men ran away with the win 222-76.
Women’s Recap
Northwestern finished in the top two spots in each event of the meet.
The Wildcat women opened up competition, setting a new pool record in the 200 medley relay; the team of Grey Davis (25.35), Teya Nikolova (27.41), Ekaterina Nikonova (23.49), and Lindsay Erving (22.24) combined to lower the previous mark from Washington University in St. Louis that was set in November in 1:41.74, clocking 1:38.59.
Individually, Nikolova stormed to a pool record of her own in the 100 breaststroke; the freshman from Bulgaria powered to the win in 1:01.16, lowering her lifetime best, and clipping her teammate, Maggie Papanicholas’ 2024 pool record of 1:01.30.
Nikonova took the win in the 50 free for Northwestern in 22.60, the only sub-23-second swimmer, and tied the pool record that was set by NYU’s Kaley McIntyre in February of 2024. She later added a win in the 100 free, swimming the only sub-50-second swim of the meet in 48.97.
Northwestern sophomore Claire Mehok crushed both the field and the pool record in the 200 back; Mehok clocked the only sub-2:00 performance of the meet, touching in 1:56.41. That time was more than two seconds faster than Cindy Cheng‘s 2017 pool record time of 1:58.46.
Freshman Kayla Rodriguez continued the Wildcats’ record-breaking ways with her win in the 200 breast, storming to a new pool record in 2:14.39. Though still off her best time from the Texas Hall of Fame Invite in 2:14.30, the time still nabbed the pool record from 2021 previously held by Jordan Wentzel of 2:14.63.
Freshman Madeline Simmons controlled the 1000 free for Northwestern, touching in 10:07.93; Simmons was the only swimmer in the event faster than 10:24.
Wildcat sophomore Bri Deierlein led the way in the 200 free, finishing over 2 seconds faster than her teammate Claire Mehok in 2nd in 1:50.44.
Senior Lindsay Ervin and Freshman Gretchen Braun battled at the top of the 100 backstroke, with Ervin taking the narrow win in 54.52 to Braun’s runner-up effort of 54.71.
Northwestern sophomores Zoe Nordmann (2:00.21) and Lilly Mehok (2:00.45) dominated the 200 fly, each finishing more than five seconds ahead of the field in the event. Nordmann later picked up another win in the 500 free, outpacing the field en route to a near 13-second win and a new pool record time of 4:47.25, besting the 2024 record time of Caitlin Marshall of 4:49.89.
Northwestern earned the top five spots on the 1-meter board; leading the way was junior Chloe Sharpe, whose winning score totaled 297.53. Sophomore Isabella Chen later helped sweep the diving events with a dominating performance of 325.50 on 3-meter, just over five points shy of the pool record of 330.60.
Lilly Mehok soared to the 100 fly win in 54.36, producing her 2nd fastest time this season, only behind her best of 53.88, from the Hall of Fame Invite.
Davis held on to win the 200 IM over her teammate Hana Shimizu-Bowers (2:02.17), stopping the clock in 2:01.76.
Northwestern’s Isabelle Chow (51.16), Deierlein (49.80), Sydney Smith (50.43), and Davis (52.11) put the finishing touches on the winning effort for the Wildcats in a combined 3:23.50 to take the 400 free relay win.
Men’s Recap
The Northwestern men mirrored the women’s success, notching a new pool record in the 200 medley relay. Stuart Seymour (21.55), Joshua Staples (23.66), Connor Schuster (20.79), and Oli Kos (19.15) cruised to a winning time of 1:25.15. That time bested Emory’s 2024 pool record of 1:26.81.
Wildcats junior Adam Cohen topped the point totals in the men’s 1-meter diving event, winning with a score of 385.58, notching the pool record in the event, topping Geneseo’s Trent Makowiec, whose former record score sat at 377.40 from November of 2024. Cohen earned his 2nd win of the meet on the 3-meter, scoring 350.40.
Northwestern sophomore Alexander Rousseau earned a win in the 1000 free, touching in 9:11.71, just off of his lifetime best that he set at the Texas Hall of Fame Invite in November in 9:11.25. Rousseau doubled up the distance wins with a big win in the 500 free, clocking 4:30.87, five and a half seconds ahead of anybody else in the event.
Junior Connor Schuster nearly swam a new best in the 200 free for Northwestern, clocking a winning time of 1:36.24, just missing his best time of 1:36.09 from the Texas Hall of Fame Invite.
Kos kept the momentum high for the Wildcats, adding the win in the 100 back, clocking his 2nd fastest time of the season in 47.60.
The men’s 100 breast was a tight battle between three Wildcats: freshman George Groves (54.28), junior Chris Leung (54.37), and Seymour (54.41) swam nearly identical races until Groves powered home in 28.47 to lead the way for Northwestern.
Wildcats junior Caden Duncan nearly cracked into 19-second territory in the 50 free, finishing with the top time on the meet in 20.11. He doubled up on the sprint free victories with a close win in the 100 free, touching the wall just 13 hundredths ahead of Chicago’s John Butler (43.67) in 43.54.
Seymour was untouchable in the 200 back, turning in a final time of 1:43.95; the next fastest was his teammate John Doyle, who finished in 1:48.19.
Staples cruised to the win in the 200 breast, clocking the fastest time of 1:54.93, nearly four seconds ahead of his teammate Matthew Lucky in 1:58.70. Staples later earned the final individual event win of the meet with his performance in the 200 IM, clocking 1:45.42.
Junior Cooper Costello took home two wins for Chicago; first in the 200 fly, Costello’s final 50, the only sub-28-second split, helped him reach the wall first in 1:45.33. Costello later swept the fly events with a win in the 100 fly, where his 46.72 led the way ahead of four Wildcats.
Chicago’s quartet of Costello (44.72), Alex Schwartz (46.30), Rylan Kruep (44.96), and John Butler (43.13) closed out the meet on a high note, winning the 400 free relay in 2:59.11, a second and a half better than Northwestern in 3:00.61.
Model the meet as a Poisson–binomial process. For events e = 1,…,E, let I_e ∈ {0,1} indicate whether UChicago wins event e, with P(I_e = 1) = p_e. Total UChicago event wins are: W = Σ_{e=1..E} I_e Event win probabilities come from a performance-variance model. Let each team’s “best swim” in event e be a random draw: T_U,e ~ Normal(μ_U,e, σ_e^2) T_N,e ~ Normal(μ_N,e, σ_e^2) UChicago wins if T_U,e < T_N,e. Define D_e = T_N,e − T_U,e, then: D_e ~ Normal(μ_N,e − μ_U,e, 2σ_e^2) So the per-event upset probability is: p_e = P(D_e > 0) = Φ( (μ_N,e − μ_U,e) / (sqrt(2) · σ_e) ) Big Ten programs shift μ faster across essentially all strokes and distances due… Read more »It wouldn’t have been so sweet for NU had the 800 free relay been on the event lineup…
Anyone who got beat by a Maroon is getting cut
The Chicago flyer can swim at NU or most D1 schools.
Currently writing about this and another meet that just happened. Should be out soon but all I’ll say for the moment is this dude has been blessed with the photo with Luca Urlando so now he’s gonna dominate in March.
D1 bullies beating up on my D3 Maroons.