Big Ten Men Go Crazy on Breaststroke Splits, Michigan Takes First Relays

2021 BIG TEN MEN’S CHAMPIONSHIPS

The Big Ten Men’s Championships started tonight, with Michigan winning both relays and Minnesota junior Max McHugh posting the fastest 200 medley relay breast split in history.

Besides McHugh’s impressive split, the Big Ten’s breaststroke depth really shone through tonight. After McHugh was the only sub-23 in the field at this meet last year (22.99), this year, four men turned in 22-plus breaststroke splits. Other sub-23 splits included Michigan’s Will Chan (22.67), Purdue’s Trent Pellini (22.82) and Ohio State’s Hudson McDaniel (22.97). Chan now ranks #4 all-time and Pellini eighth.

At the ACC Championships and SEC Championships, there was one 22-point breast leg, each: Louisville’s Evgenii Somov (22.91) at ACCs and Tennessee’s Michael Houlie (22.77) at SECs. There were none at Big 12s, while Pac-12s are running the 200 medley later this evening. By NCAAs, though, the Big Ten will most likely have the lion’s share of 22-second breast splits as a conference.

Looking back to the 2019 NCAA Championships, which is the last NCAA Championships since the 2020 meet was canceled due to the pandemic, only USC’s Carsten Vissering split under 23 in the 200 medley relay finals. Now, with at least six 22-point legs (and probably more after Pac-12s) going into NCAAs, it’s looking like a 23-low split on a medley relay is no longer an edge.

Tonight, Michigan looked dominant, winning the 200 medley by almost a full second and the 800 free relay by over a second. Take a look at the relay split performances below, sectioned by medley leg and then illustrating 800 free relay splits at the bottom.

Ohio State led the way with the top two 800 free relay legs, including lead-off Paul Delakis at 1:31.90, a new lifetime best as he looks to be the 200 free favorite. The Buckeyes also had the best medley anchor with Sem Andreis‘s 18.43, while Michigan’s River Wright posted the field’s best fly leg with a blazing 19.88.

RELAY SPLITS

50 BACK

SCHOOL SWIMMER SPLIT
Michigan Wyatt Davis 21.07
Ohio State Colin McDermott 21.25
Indiana Brendan Burns 21.31
Penn State Will Roberson 21.36
Purdue Michael Juengel 21.56
Iowa Anze Fers Erzen 21.58
Wisconsin Wes Jekel 21.71
Northwestern Manu Bacarizo 21.77
Michigan State Evan Stanislaw 22.56
Minnesota Desmon Sachtjen 22.57

50 BREAST

SCHOOL SWIMMER SPLIT
Minnesota Max McHugh 22.40
Michigan Will Chan 22.67
Purdue Trent Pellini 22.82
Ohio State Hudson McDaniel 22.97
Indiana Zane Backes 23.22
Wisconsin Andrew Benson 23.39
Iowa Will Myhre 23.50
Northwestern Kevin Houseman 23.60
Penn State Daniel Raisanen 24.10
Michigan State Travis Nitkiewicz 24.44

50 FLY 

SCHOOL SWIMMER SPLIT
Michigan River Wright 19.88
Indiana Tomer Frankel 20.13
Penn State Jacob Houck 20.32
Iowa Sergey Kuznetsov 20.57
Ohio State Justin Fleagle 20.62
Michigan State Bradley Sanford 20.63
Wisconsin Erik Gessner 20.72
Purdue Ryan Hrosik 20.85
Minnesota Kaiser Neverman 21.17
Northwestern Alessandro Burdisso 21.27

50 FREE

SCHOOL SWIMMER SPLIT
Ohio State Sem Andreis 18.43
Purdue Nikola Acin 18.59
Indiana Jack Franzman 18.69
Michigan Gus Borges 18.73
Penn State Gabe Castano 19.08
Minnesota Lucas Farrar 19.26
Northwestern Andrew Zhang 19.41
Iowa Seth Miller 19.41
Wisconsin Ryan Delaney 19.42
Michigan State Kevin Mills 19.71

200 FREE SPLITS

TEAM SWIMMER SPLIT
Ohio State Paul Delakis
1:31.90 *lead-off*
Ohio State Hunter Armstrong 1:32.66
Michigan Patrick Callan
1:32.67 *lead-off*
Michigan Jake Mitchell 1:32.95
Indiana Van Mathias 1:33.11
Indiana Tomer Frankel
1:33.17 *lead-off*
Indiana Brendan Burns 1:33.54
Michigan Wyatt Davis 1:33.67
Michigan Danny Berlitz 1:33.71
Purdue Nicholas Sherman
1:33.81 *lead-off*
Wisconsin Jacob Newmark
1:34.33 *lead-off*
Penn State Michael Daly
1:34.39 *lead-off*
Northwestern Connor LaMastra 1:34.49
Ohio State John Satterfield 1:34.65
Wisconsin Josh Dannhauser 1:34.94
Northwestern Liam Gately 1:34.96
Iowa Mateusz Arndt
1:35.09 *lead-off*
Wisconsin Caleb Aman 1:35.18
Minnesota Sawyer Grimes 1:35.21
Northwestern Ben Forbes 1:35.24
Iowa Evan Holt 1:35.30
Ohio State Thomas Watkins 1:35.30
Wisconsin Andrew Benson 1:35.79
Northwestern Aleksa Bobar
1:35.89 *lead-off*
Purdue Batuhan Hakan 1:35.93
Iowa Andrew Fierke 1:36.07
Iowa Aleksey Tarasenko 1:36.10
Indiana Jacob Destrampe 1:36.30
Minnesota James Freeman 1:36.37
Minnesota Cameron Kelley
1:36.55 *lead-off*
Minnesota Tom Donker 1:36.61
Penn State William Lulek 1:36.72
Penn State Lachlan Byrne 1:36.82
Purdue Andrew Alders 1:37.43
Purdue Jude Wenker 1:37.46
Penn State Hayden Harlow 1:37.50
Michigan State Aiden Farley
1:37.78 *lead-off*
Michigan State James Gavin 1:38.20
Michigan State Peter Corsetti 1:38.70
Michigan State Jack Hiss 1:43.69

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Coach Chackett
3 years ago

River fast at 19.88!

Sean S
3 years ago

It seems like having the lanes open in between relays is making a huge difference for the men. Especially for the 200 FR and 200 Medley Relays.

About Karl Ortegon

Karl Ortegon

Karl Ortegon studied sociology at Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT, graduating in May of 2018. He began swimming on a club team in first grade and swam four years for Wesleyan.

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