After an illustrious five-year career with the Ohio State Buckeyes, Kristen Romano is making the move to Knoxville and joining the burgeoning pro group at the University of Tennessee.
Romano, 23, announced the news on Instagram Sunday, making it official that she’s turning pro after exhausting her collegiate eligibility this past March.
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A native of Puerto Rico, Romano made it clear her goal is to qualify for the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. Last year, she was not selected for the Tokyo 2020 Games by the Puerto Rican Swimming Federation.
Romano does have plenty of international experience representing Puerto Rico, however, including competing at the 2022 World Championships this past summer.
In Budapest, Romano placed 16th in the women’s 400 IM and 29th in the 200 IM, and she’s also competed for the nation at the 2019 LC Worlds and 2021 SC Worlds.
Romano grew up in the United States and competed at the U.S. Olympic Trials in 2016, coming out of the Long Island Aquatic Club (LIAC) in New York. But since 2018, she’s competed under the Puerto Rican flag internationally.
Romano is coming off a very successful five-year career at Ohio State that included three individual Big Ten titles (and one relay victory) as she helped lead the Buckeyes to three consecutive team championship titles in 2020, 2021 and 2022.
She never finished lower than third in the 400 IM at Big Tens throughout her career, winning the title in 2021, and also closed things out with back-to-back victories in the 200 IM.
At NCAAs, Romano earned a pair of First Team All-American honors in 2021, placing eighth in the 200 IM and seventh in the 800 free relay, and added three more the season prior when the championships were canceled due to COVID-19. She is also a seven-time Honorable Mention All-American, and left as the OSU school record holder in the 200 back (1:52.86), 200 IM (1:54.19) and 400 IM (4:02.13).
The pro group at Tennessee has been consistently growing over the last few months, with notable additions of late being U.S. World Championship medalist Gabby DeLoof and Dutch Olympian and former world record holder Kira Toussaint. Other current members of the group, which is head up by Tennessee head coach Matt Kredich, include Olympic silver medalist Erika Brown, two-time Short Course World Champion Tessa Cieplucha and premier sprinter Madeline Banic.
Great things happen here everyday
Are there any men at TN?
Do pro groups get to train with the college teams or do they have separate practices?
depends on the school
🐐🐐🐐🐐