NCAA Releases Pre-Selection Psych Sheets For 2026 Women’s NCAA Championships

2026 NCAA Division I Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships

• Wednesday, March 18 – Saturday, March 21, 2026
• McAuley Aquatic Center, Atlanta, GA
• Defending Champions: Virginia (5x)
• Championship Central
• Pre-Selection Psych Sheets
• Live Results
• Live Video

The pre-selection psych sheets for the 2026 Women’s NCAA Division I Swimming & Diving Championships have been released after the conference championship meets wrapped up over the weekend.

This initial release of the psych sheets doesn’t tell us who has qualified for the meet, but does show which events swimmers have opted to enter and will allow us to score out the meet and project where the cutline will fall.

Official cutlines are usually released on Wednesday afternoon.

• See the pre-selection entry sheets here.

Note that swimmers with a “W” beside their entry times on the psych sheets are the automatic qualifiers. The psych sheets have been updated from the original posting after five swimmers had “Ws” beside their names despite not hitting the NCAA cut in their conference-winning swim—but did so at a different point in the season.

We’ll be breaking down some of the notable entries throughout the day, though there aren’t many surprises among the biggest names.

Notable Entries:

• Claire Curzan (Virginia) – 100 fly, 100 back, 200 back
• Katie Grimes (Virginia) – 1650 free, 400 IM, 500 free
• Torri Huske (Stanford) – 100 fly, 50 free, 100 free
• Caroline Bricker (Stanford) – 400 IM, 200 breast, 200 fly
• Bella Sims (Michigan) – 400 IM, 100 back, 200 back
• Anna Moesch (Virginia) – 200 free, 50 free, 100 free
• Camille Spink (Tennessee) – 200 free, 50 free, 100 free
• Liberty Clark (Indiana) – 200 free, 50 free, 100 free
• Lucy Bell (Stanford) – 400 IM, 200 breast, 200 IM
• Sara Curtis (Virginia) – 100 fly, 50 free, 100 free
• Anastasia Gorbenko (Louisville) – 100 breast, 200 breast, 200 IM
• Leah Shackley (NC State) – 100 fly, 100 back, 200 back
• Mizuki Hirai (Tennessee) – 100 fly, 100 back, 100 free
• Eneli Jefimova (NC State) – 100 breast, 200 breast
• Jillian Cox (Texas) – 1650 free, 500 free
• Aimee Canny (Virginia) – 400 IM, 200 breast, 200 IM
• Alex Shackell (Indiana) – 100 fly, 200 fly

Stanford senior Torri Huske, the reigning NCAA champion in the 200 IM, has opted not to defend her title in that event this year, instead opting to race the 100 free on the final day of the meet. The change for Huske comes due to the NCAA’s new event schedule this season, as in previous campaigns, she’s raced the 200 IM over the 50 free on Day 2.

She will contest the 50 free at the NCAA Championships for the first time this season, coming in as the #2 seed behind Tennessee’s Camille Spink.

Michigan junior Bella Sims has chosen to race the 400 IM over the 200 free on Day 2, despite being the 2024 NCAA champion in the 200 free. Sims is coming off winning the Big Ten title in the 400 IM and is the top seed with her time of 3:58.02 from the CSCAA Dual Meet Challenge in November.

Sims has also entered the 100 and 200 back, which comes as no surprise after she was the runner-up to Claire Curzan last season in both races.

Curzan, fresh off breaking the NCAA and American Record in the 200 back (1:46.09) at the ACC Championships, has opted for the 100 fly as her #3 event to go along with the backstrokes, a change after she was the runner-up in the 50 free last season (again due to the new schedule).

Virginia sophomore standout Anna Moesch is in the midst of a historic season and owns the top seed in the 100 free (45.71) and 200 free (1:39.72) while also entering the 50 free (#6 seed).

Her senior teammate Aimee Canny will not race any individual freestyle events this season after contesting two at each of her first three NCAA Championship meets (racing the 100 and 200 free as a freshman before swimming the 200 free and 500 free the last two years). Canny will instead race the 200 breast, 200 IM and 400 IM. Most interestingly, she’s opted for the 400 IM over the 200 free on Day 2 despite setting a new lifetime best in the 200 free at ACCs (1:41.81).

Louisville’s first-year Anastasia Gorbenko had a myriad of event options given her versatility, but as predicted, she’ll race the 100 breast, 200 breast and 200 IM, currently owning the top seed in the 200 IM and the #3 seed in both breaststrokes.

Tennessee freshman Mizuki Hirai will focus on the 100s, selecting the 100 free, 100 back and 100 fly for her lineup at her debut NCAA Championships. None of those picks are a surprise, given it’s her exact lineup from SECs.

Indiana freshman Alex Shackell has notably only entered two individual events, the 100 and 200 fly, indicating she’ll likely swim five relays for the Hoosiers. She won’t have any individual races on Day 3, where her most likely option would’ve been the 50 free.

The Virginia Cavaliers are the top seed in all five relays, coming in as the defending champs in all but the 800 free relay.

Other defending champions in the field include Curzan in the 100 and 200 back, Stanford’s Lucy Bell in the 200 breast and her teammate Caroline Bricker in the 400 IM, and Jillian Cox in the 500 and 1650 free.

The rest of last year’s individual winners, Gretchen Walsh (50 free, 100 free, 100 fly), Alex Walsh (100 breast), Anna Peplowski (200 free) and Emma Sticklen (200 fly) have graduated, and of course Huske won’t be defending her title in the 200 IM.

TOP SEEDS IN EACH EVENT

• 1650 Free – Jillian Cox, Texas, 15:32.75
• 200 Medley Relay – Virginia, 1:31.91
• 800 Free Relay – Virginia, 6:45.34
• 100 Fly – Torri Huske, Stanford, 48.26
• 400 IM – Bella Sims, Michigan, 3:58.02
• 200 Free – Anna Moesch, Virginia, 1:39.72
• 100 Breast – Eneli Jefimova, NC State, 56.72
• 200 Free Relay – Virginia, 1:23.75
• 100 Back – Claire Curzan, Virginia, 48.38
• 200 Breast – Lucy Bell, Stanford, 2:02.67
• 500 Free – Jillian Cox, Texas, 4:30.53
• 50 Free – Camille Spink, Tennessee, 20.87
• 400 Medley Relay – Virginia, 3:20.42
• 200 IM – Anastasia Gorbenko, Louisville, 1:51.30
• 100 Free – Anna Moesch, Virginia, 45.71
• 200 Fly – Hannah Bellard, Michigan, 1:50.34
• 200 Back – Claire Curzan, Virginia, 1:46.09
• 400 Free Relay – Virginia, 3:05.30

SELECTION PROCESS

The NCAA invites the same number of overall swimmers every year. 270 men and 322 women make the meet annually. Depending on how many of those 270/322 athletes qualify in multiple events, the numbers can range for how many entries get invited in each event

Things look a bit different this year than we’ve seen in the past after the NCAA implemented a new qualifying window for individual conference championships that meet the standard.

Our math told us that 75 women and 86 men earned automatic berths into the NCAA Championships (including Power conference swimmers).

The new qualifying procedure, in its simplest terms:

• Step 1: Divers go in (35 men, 41 women)
• Step 2: All individual swimmers who won a conference championship AND hit the Qualifying Standard in that event get the auto-bid.
• Step 3: (Steps 3 & 4 are similar to years past) Swimmers are added one at a time in each event, keeping the number of qualifiers in each event the same* until the entry cap is reached (235 swimmers for men, 281 swimmers for women).
• Step 4: When the entry cap is reached, you wind up with a ‘final row’ in each event. For women, that’s usually around #40, for men, that’s usually around #30 in each event. Swimmers already qualified in step two are now guaranteed their spot, while the rest are ranked by their time as a percentage of the qualifying standard, with the fastest times added one at a time until the cap is met.

The 2026 Women’s NCAA Championships will kick off Wednesday, March 18 and run through Saturday, March 21, at Georgia Tech’s McAuley Aquatic Center in Atlanta.