Data Visualization Maps Out The Tight Race for a Top 5 Finish At 2023 Men’s NCAAs

2023 NCAA DIVISION I MEN’S SWIMMING & DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS

• March 22-25, 2023
• Jean K. Freeman Aquatic Center | Minneapolis, MN
• SCY (25 yards)
• Meet Central
• Psych Sheets
• SwimSwam Preview Index
• SwimSwam Pick ’em Contest
• Live Results

The 2023 Men’s Division I NCAA Championships are just under 24 hours from kicking off in Minneapolis, so let’s take a look at how the meet would turn out if everything happened exactly the way it’s projected to on paper, according to the official pre-scratch psych sheets.

It’s important to keep in mind that the psych sheet does not include diving points.

Division I Men’s NCAA Championship Scored Psych Sheet: Top 20 Teams

Cal is expected to repeat as the NCAA champions, racking up a projected point total of 453.5. Arizona State is hot on their heels though, seeded just 27 points behind the defending champions–a testament to both how fast they swam in-season and their performance en route to their first ever PAC-12 title. Bob Bowman reiterated post-conference that NCAAs is their focus this year, so it will be interesting to see if they can hold or improve on their seeds after already dropping so many fast times.

The visualization highlights something we’ve known about Cal for a long time: they get better as the meet goes on, and they’re ridiculously strong on day 4. The Golden Bears are expected to briefly take the lead after the 200 IM, but hand it back to Florida after the 50 free. In fact, for the majority of the meet it’s Florida and ASU that are expected to trade the lead until Cal takes over convincingly on day 4.

Of course, you have to show up and swim well to earn the points–that’s why the trophies aren’t handed out when the psych sheets drop. One team that the psych sheet undervalues is Texas, who after finishing in the top two the last eight seasons are running in seventh. We talked about this when the psych sheet first dropped: essentially, no matter how much stock you put into Texas’ seeding, they’re going to have to outperform their seeds to climb back to their usual spot in the standings.

It won’t just be Texas looking to climb up the standings, though. There’s a close race going on between six teams for a spot in the top 5, and even if first place gets locked up before the end of the meet there will still be tight battles going on for the rest of the team trophies.

Now, let’s take a closer look at the fight for top five.

Division I Men’s NCAA Championship Scored Psych Sheet: Top 7 Teams

Looking closer at the top seven teams shows how fluid the race for the title is expected to be. Florida and ASU are projected to be constantly trading the lead, making those depth swimmers and ‘B’ final races as important as ever. Additionally, they (and the rest of these teams) will be looking to outperform their seeds, something Cal has historically done very well.

This zoomed in perspective also shows that NC State is expected to be a solid fourth place. They’re expected to maintain that spot through the 500 free through the end of the meet. Points-wise, they’re on a bit of an island, over a 100 projected points behind #3 Florida but up on #5 Tennessee by nearly the same amount. In reality, we’d be quite surprised if there was this much of a gap in the middle of the standings.

Though the Tennessee women performed well at NCAAs and showed that there was a focus on NCAAs over SECs, we aren’t really expecting the Volunteers to get involved in the top 5 battle. Indiana is going to get a lot of diving points, which aren’t factored into this graph and Texas will likely outperform their seeds as well.

2023 Men’s NCAAs – PROJECTED TEAM STANDINGS

Data compiled by Andrew Mering

2023 Men’s NCAAs – PROJECTED TEAM SCORES AFTER EACH EVENT

Data compiled by Andrew Mering