We’ve now seen the new NCAA Championships schedule play out in full with the conclusion of the Women’s Division I Swimming & Diving Championships, and attention now shifts to the Men’s Championships, which begin Wednesday.
The updated schedule quickly became a major talking point among swimmers, coaches, media, and fans—but it raises a bigger question: what is the best possible championship format?
Like most things in the sport, there’s no single right answer. Preferences vary depending on how you prioritize, such as athlete recovery, overlap, relay placement, or overall meet flow.
Nine years ago, SwimSwam contributor Kevin Hallman ran the numbers to determine the best NCAA Championships event schedules. By his calculations, there were 1.5 million distinct combinations (considering only individual events).
Now we turn the conversation over to you. If you could build the perfect NCAA Championship schedule, what would it look like?
We invite you to drop your ideal day-by-day lineup in the comments. Keep it simple, get creative, and feel free to explain your reasoning—or just list your events. Want to include relays? Go for it. Want to rethink the structure completely? Even better. Do you want the 200 IM to be one of the first individual races of the meet again? Be our guest.
For reference, here is the current NCAA Championships schedule. Mix and match however you would like:
Wednesday, March 25
- 1650 Freestyle
- 200 Medley Relay
- 800 Free Relay
Thursday, March 26
- 100 Butterfly
- 400 IM
- 200 Freestyle
- 100 Breaststroke
- 200 Free Relay
- 1-meter Diving
Friday, March 27
- 100 Backstroke
- 200 Breaststroke
- 500 Freestyle
- 50 Freestyle
- 400 Medley Relay
- 3-meter Diving
Saturday, March 28
- 200 IM
- 100 Freestyle
- 200 Butterfly
- 200 Backstroke
- 400 Free Relay
- Platform Diving
Assuming we keep the Wed – Sat meet, I went back to the 2025 schedule with some tweaks:
Wed: 200 Medley Relay, 800 Free Relay
Thurs: 50 free, 100 Breast, 100 Back, 400 IM, 1 Mtr Diving, 200 Free Relay
Fri: 200 Free, 100 Fly, 500 Free, 200 IM, 3 Mtr Diving, 400 Medley Relay
Sat: 200 Back, 1650 Free, 100 Free, 200 Breast, 200 Fly, Platform Diving, 400 Free Relay
I swapped the 400 IM with the 200 IM to reduce conflicts. I also moved the 100 Back and 100 Breast to avoid a conflict with the new 200 IM day. I moved the 200 Free to first on Friday in case anyone wants to double… Read more »
200 free and 500 free the same day will never happen.
Go the D2 format with some tweaks (and bring back the B finals):
4.5 day format…
800FR on Day 0 (use this as a way to introduce the meet, the scoring, initial storylines, the schedule, all kinds of broadcasting opportunities to help whet the appetite as the event is going on and between heats…stream this day and let it set up the actual broadcast to happen the next 4 days):
Day 1: 1000Fr, 200IM, 50Fr, 200MR
Day 2: 400IM, 100Fly, 200Fr, 400MR
Day 3: 500Fr, 100Bk, 100Br, 200Fly, 200FR
Day 4: 1650Fr, 100Fr, 200 Bk, 200Br, 400FR
Each day has a “distance” event (1000Fr, 400IM, 500Fr, 1650Fr). Make those events Timed Finals. Swim them all the same… Read more »
First make it a combined meet and move it to the week of the Final 4. That would give much more availability for TV exposure. I would say adopt the format the ACC used this year except only have A and B final. Run Diving Saturday to Monday. Then have swimming run Monday night to Friday. So it ends before the start of the Final 4. Monday night you would run a Women’s Diving Final then 200 MR a Men’s Diving Final and then the 800 Free Relay. Keep everything else the same as ACC. During the breaks before the Relays show Tape delayed diving finals from Saturday and Sunday. They could be edited to an exact time let’s say… Read more »
Must also become Olympic format Long Course in order to expand NCAA swimming viewership beyond Parents. Until this happens, the interest level will remain low.
Apply same production level as Olympic Trials. NCAA Championships need to be long course to recruit new viewers(other than parents). NCAA championships should have a direct marketing link to the Olympics. Olympic format is the proven model…..copy it(and become the 2nd version of what works).
The expansion to a full 4-day meet seems inevitable. Maybe even M&W combined like Division 3. The current D3 NCAA schedule is a little clunky with only introducing Bk and Br in Day 3 and knocking out IMs in Day 1-2. So here’s another option:
— Day 1: 500 Free, 200 IM, 100 Fly, 200 Free Relay
— Day 2: 100 Back, 100 Breast, 200 Free, 400 Medley Relay
— Day 3: 200 Medley Relay, 400 IM, 100 Free, 200 Breast, 800 Free Relay
— Day 4: 1650 Free, 200 Back, 50 Free, 200 Fly, 400 Free Relay
I don’t love the dull gradual descent in freestyle race distances, but there are limited options if… Read more »
Current event order except:
1) 400FR-R goes first on the last day. 1650 then acts as a natural rest time. minimizes total time spent in break mode.
2) Diving runs concurrently. Separate broadcast. No diving breaks (but still some awards during that time)
3) Close the meet out with skins. Stroke chosen by medley relay winning team. Skins is worth 1.5x individual event. In any meet that came down to that event to decide the victor, it would be ELECTRIC. Skins also has a degree of randomness to it, which our sport depserately needs. The #1 reason it can be boring is not format-related. It’s simply that it is preordained and you know who is gonna win… Read more »
No clown diving, no boring 1650, add 200 underwater relay, repeal the 15 meter rule, combine M&W meet, coordinate gambling on winners, wining times and 1-2-3 orders of finish and offer $10,000,000 prize to the person who gets the 50 free, 100 breast and 800 FrRelay exact times.
How about this as an example flow for the final day (day 4) of the championship:
Diving finals will have 6 divers (8 if they can all get through the round in 3.5 minutes)
Broadcast starts at starting beep of 1650. First half of 1650 can be shown while the commentators do their usual… Read more »
Hmmm. Interesting. Most divers wouldn’t mind the splits any more than the 3and 3 I think. Diving with 8 in finals should take under 5 to 6 minutes a round. Any more and it is the broadcasters fault. Prelims run faster than that per diver. To keep back and forth to a minimum, I’d start the evening with 3 rounds of diving and do last three before the relay.
Best place to put diving though is to put 1m between the 200 medley relay and the 800 free. Fills dead time.
Last year ESPN a put a one minute commercial break after every round, and slowed down the pace to add replays and commentary as they do on… Read more »