#1 Virginia vs. #25 Virginia Tech (Women’s Recap)
- January 14, 2022
- SCY (25 yards)
- UVA Aquatic and Fitness Center, Charlottesville, Virginia
- Full Results
- Livestream
- Men’s Recap
The Virginia women were doing Virginia women things again, opening their 2023 with a dominant 207-91 win against in-state rival Virginia Tech. Headlining the meet was the trio of Kate Douglass, Gretchen Walsh, and Alex Walsh, who combined for five event wins.
Douglass swam her first 200-yard IM since November 2021 at this meet, winning by over nine seconds in a time of 1:52.07. Not only is this time faster than her 2021-22 season best of 1:52.21, but it also leads the NCAA this season by over a second. That’s particularly impressive considering it was done at a dual meet in a practice suit. For comparison, the second-fastest time in the NCAA this year was clocked by Torri Huske, who went 1:53.37 suited at the Tennessee Invite.
While Douglass opened her race considerably faster when setting her season-best last year, she was much stronger on her back half today, being over half a second faster on both breast and free. In fact, Douglass posted her fastest breast and free splits ever today.
Comparative Splits, 2023 vs. 2021:
| Kate Douglass, UVA vs. VT 2023 | Kate Douglass, 2021 Tennesse Invite | |
| Fly | 24.27 | 23.97 |
| Back | 28.55 | 28.07 |
| Breast | 32.47 | 33.03 |
| Free | 26.78 | 27.14 |
| Total | 1:52.07 | 1:52.21 |
After taking bronze in the event at the Tokyo Olympics, Douglass took a break from the 200 IM, dropping the event at the 2022 World Championship trials and opting to swim the 50 free instead at NCAAs. However, she gained momentum in the 200 IM again after winning the 2022 Short Course World title in a time of 2:02.12 (almost breaking Katinka Hosszu’s world record of 2:01.86), and her recent performances raise questions of whether she should swim the event at NCAAs over the 50 free—a race where she holds the NCAA, US Open, and American record.
Douglass did race the 50 free at this meet as well, clocking a 21.64 to place second behind Gretchen Walsh. While she didn’t touch the wall first, she did swim her fastest dual meet time ever in the event. Walsh being 3-0 against Douglass in the 50 free could potentially be another reason to steer Douglass towards the 200 IM at NCAAs.
That being said, Walsh touched first with a 21.26. And while that time would have finished third at NCAAs last year, it’s only her third-fastest mark of the 2022-23 season—a testament to how dominant she has been in the event this season. Walsh’s personal best is the NCAA-leading 20.94 she went at the 2022 Tennessee Invite, and she also clocked a 21.16 at the UVA-Texas dual meet last November.
Walsh also raced an “off” event, the 200 back, and went 1:51.42. That swim was only her third time ever swimming the event, and she dropped 0ver three seconds from her previous best time of 1:54.67 that was set in the 2022 rendition of the UVA-VT dual. In addition, her time also would have been just 0.27 seconds away from what it took to make the ‘A’ final at 2022 NCAAs, which is a testament to her untapped potential in 200-yard events (which she doesn’t seem at major meets to prioritize the sprints).
With her two event wins today, Walsh continues her unbeaten streak for individual events in the 2022-23 season.
On the contrary, Alex Walsh took up sprint events today, despite the 200s being her strong suit. She clocked a 48.56 to win the 100 free, shaving 0.03 seconds off her personal best that was set at a dual meet last January. She also won the 100 fly by nearly two seconds, clocking a 51.91.
Notably, all of Douglass and the Walsh sisters’ swims were done in a practice suit.
Another notable swimmer competing today was UVA freshman and South African Olympian Aimee Canny, who raced in her first-ever NCAA meet. She missed the first semester of the 2022-23 season to finish school in South Africa, and arrived at Virginia earlier this month.
Canny won the 200 free in a time of 1:46.10, was second in the 200 IM behind Douglass (2:00.95), and placed third in the 100 free (49.68). She comes in with converted best times of 22.08/47.99/1:43.79, and could potentially be one of Virginia’s biggest sprint freestyle forces if she can hit those times.
Senior Ella Nelson took two event wins today, as she was first in both the 500 free (4:48.21) and 100 breast (1:00.85). That 100 breast time was a massive personal best for Nelson, who is a two-time NCAA A-finalist in the 200 breast but doesn’t typically race the sprints. Prior to today, her fastest 100 breast time was over a second slower at 1:02.08.
Setting a new season-best today was Sam Baron, who clocked a 1:56.64 to win the 200 fly. That time is nearly two seconds faster than the 1:58.53 she swam at midseason invites, and is just end a second off her personal best of 1:55.66. Baron is a rookie for UVA, having competed her first two seasons with UCLA.
Freshman Emma Weber also posted a season-best of 2:11.69 to win the 200 breast, beating her midseasons time of 2:12.01.
Other event winners included Maddie Donohoe in the 1000 free (9:48.87) and Reilly Tiltmann in the 100 back (53.02). Jennifer Bell won both the one-meter and three-meter diving events.
Along with their dominant individual wins, Virginia also swept the relays. Abby Harter (50.76), Gretchen Walsh (46.99), Tiltmann (50.26), and Lexi Cuomo(49.15) won the 400 free relay in a 3:17.76, though Alex Walsh and Maxine Parker posted strong splits of 48.21 and 48.31 respectively on a separate relay team.
G. Walsh, A. Walsh, Cuomo (23.97) and Douglass (21.15) also posted a 1:35.08 to win the 200 medley relay. MeetMobile says that Gretchen Walsh split 24.95 and Alex Walsh split 25.01, but that is likely not accurate because on the livestream, Walsh clearly touched the wall with a sub-24 second time (the display clock does not stop for splits).
With the Virginia women racing exhibition in the event, Virginia Tech’s Morgan Miller took her team’s one official win, swimming 2:01.56 to touch the wall third in the 200 fly. 2022 NCAA ‘A’ finalist Emma Atkinson also posted a season-best of 1:54.58 in the 200 back, as she didn’t race the event at midseasons.
“I did not expect our swimmers to swim this well at this point of the season and I am very happy with the way they really competed against UVA,” Virginia Tech head coach Sergio Lopez Miro said to SwimSwam after the meet.
Virginia next competes in a tri-meet against NC State and UNC on Janurary 20/21, whereas Virginia Tech will race Penn State on January 14.
It should be noted that GW has kept her ncaa unbeaten streak alive, even with racing against the reigning NCAA champion and record holder in the 50 free and then swimming an off event. A lot of the buzz from the meet seems to be focused on KD, but Gretchen continues to astound. Simply exchange the practice suit for a race suit and that 21.26 is right around the ncaa record. The rest of her swims were outstanding too.
Off-the-run women’s NCAA predictions:
The new young batch of USA females are pretty scary. None of them (other than arguably Huske) have really properly “popped” in LCM individually, but if they were all on their A game at the same meet they’d be pretty dominant.
I’d say Curzan, Douglass & A Walsh have each accomplished the highest levels at LCM. Alex Walsh is the World Champion & is the gold medal favorite in the 2 IM. I’d say Douglass has firmly put herself in the mix to win Olympic gold in the 2 breast. Curzan has earned podium swims in LCM & is a candidate to get 2-3 individual podium swims in the Paris Olympics.
Regan Smith is also in that age group and she’s had LCM success too.
Simply KATE DOUGLASS
HTow did Clair Tuggle do ? Meant How.
Where can I see this meet again? I bought a year subscription to ESPN but I can only see the Diving and not the swimming meet
If you have ESPN this should work.
https://www.espn.com/watch/player/_/id/41c86b31-d661-418a-a168-3d7007ae84f1#bucketId=3
I can only see the Diving. If I follow your link, I go to the live show but I can not find the swimming meet
There are separate replays – 1 for diving, 1 for swimming as diving was done as a separate session. You need to select the replay for swimming (they are not labeled as such, so try one, if not that one, then try the other)
Could you send me the link??
Hey Swimswam if you are going to write an article that doesn’t even mention VIrginia Tech until the last paragraph you should call it a promotional piece for the Virginia Womens swim program and not even pretend that it is a journalistic article.
Because yknow…in meet recaps…the most impressive swims and event winners are the ones that get the most attention…
Get him Yanyan! 😂
swimdad got owned lol
Well when ACC’s come around and the UVA Womens team break a bunch of records (which they will), win almost all of the events (which they will) and they sweep the relays (which they probably will) i guess we are all content with anyone who finishes second or third will be relegated to the last paragraph.
This is a swimming news site. Most of the newsworthy swimming was done by the UVA women. If you ran the Boston marathon in 3 hours and looked up a “journalistic article”, as you put it, on the results of the race, would you complain that they didn’t mention you and only covered the world-class times put up by the fastest athletes?
Terrible comment
Damn, I didn’t know Gio Reyna was a swimmer.
On the 200 medley relay, GW was 23.3, AW 26.6. It showed up on the scoreboard at the meet.
and notably Weber split 26.2 for the breast leg on the UVA D medley.
I’m not sure many of the 2medley relay back/breast splits are accurate (ex. the Walsh sisters). It says Bathurst split 26.7 on that same relay—she usually opens her 100 backs faster than that.