Will Hamilton had a huge season-opening day at the Cal Poly “King and Queen of the Pool” event, winning a tight battle with defending “King of the Pool” Ryan Murphy for the 2014 title.
Meanwhile on the women’ side, sophomore Celina Li won her second title in a row, remaining undefeated at the “Queen of the Pool” meet for her college career.
The format meet combines five different 100-yard races. Each swimmer competes in the 100 fly, 100 back, 100 breast, 100 free and 100 IM, with all five times added up to determine the overall winners.
Murphy, last year’s breakout freshman star who won two NCAA titles, actually dropped well over two seconds from his 2013 winning composite time. But Hamilton, who didn’t compete at this meet last year, was always one small step ahead. Hamilton ended up with a combined time of 4:07.25 to Murphy’s 4:08.62.
Hamilton, a senior, won the first and last events, going 48.35 to win the 100 fly and 49.15 in the 100 IM. Murphy had some ground to cover heading out of butterfly, but the sophomore backstroking sensation went 47.5 to win by over a second with Jacob Pebley second (48.77).
Some new faces showed up on the breaststroke, of course, but Hamilton managed a third-place showing in 55.45 to stay in the lead. Chuck Katis, in his second season with the team, was fastest at 54.04, and Josh Prenot was 55.05.
Murphy won the 100 free at 44.2, but still trailed Hamilton by eight tenths, and Hamilton came up with the dagger swim with his 100 IM victory. Murphy was second, a half-second back at 49.64.
Prenot wound up third overall with a composite time of 4:10.76, more than four seconds faster than he went at this time last year. The rest of the top 5: Katis at 4:12.11 and Jacob Pebley at 4:16.47.
Celina Li won her women’s title on pure versatility, never winning a single stroke but also never finishing outside the top 3. Li was the runner-up on butterfly, freestyle and IM to bookend the competition.
Canadian freshman Noemie Thomas showed that she’ll be a force to be reckoned with as a first-year, winning the 100 fly in 53.59. Li was second in that race, going 54.41 with Rachel Bootsma third (54.94).
Bootsma came back to win the 100 back, a race she won at the 2013 NCAA Championships but fell off in last season. Her time of 54.67 just bettered her teammate Elizabeth Pelton, who went 54.86. Li snuck in for third place at 55.29, profiting from the absence of Golden Bears’ star Missy Franklin, who did not compete in this stroke or the breaststroke.
In the breaststroke, it was Spanish sophomore Marina Garcia who picked up the win, going 1:03.84 to blow away the competition. Freshman Maija Roses out of SwimMAC was second at 1:05.42, and Li once again took bronze with a 1:05.70.
Franklin, who swam the butterfly (55.96) but skipped the back and breast legs, returned to win the 100 free with a 50.27, nearly a second up on the rest of the field. Still, missing those two strokes put her out of the running for the overall crown, which she nearly took from Li last season.
Second in that 100 free was junior Elizabeth Pelton, who stormed back with big swims in the final two events to take second overall. Pelton was 51.02, but Li came in right behind at 51.18 to keep control of the overall lead.
In the 100 IM, it was once again Pelton and Li duking it out, with Pelton going 56.21 for the win and Li taking silver in 56.32. Franklin was third at 57.13.
That allowed Li to claim the overall crown for the second year in a row, going 4:42.90 combined, just two tenths faster than she was a year ago. Pelton was second in 4:45.34, which is nearly three seconds faster than her time last season. In an encouraging sign for Cal, most of that drop came breaststroke, where Pelton was about two seconds faster than 2013.
Bootsma took third (4:47.02) with Kelly Naze (4:50.20) and freshman Jasmine Mau (4:51.59) rounding out the top 5. Mau is part of a very solid freshman class that looked good here, with Roses and Thomas also making waves.
The winners for the host Cal-Poly were junior Alison de Paralta for the women and Brandon Nguyen and Mickey Mackle, who tied for the men’s crown. De Peralta rode 58s in fly and back to an overall score of 5:03.99. Nguyen and Mackle were both fast in the fly (51.48 for Nguyen, 51.88 for Mackle). Nguyen put up a 58.57 to pull away on breaststroke, but Mackle closed with a 52.56 IM to tie things up at the finish.
POL,
Missy went to Cal because she wanted to be a STUDENT-athlete. Notice how STUDENT comes first. Believe it or not, there is life after swimming and why not go to one of the better academic schools out there to do it. Still training at home without a degree is not a logical step. I’m sure making great friends and teammates at school that will be there for her the rest of her life is a better experience that her being on her own training for 2016.
Now you using Missy as an example to denounce college swimming is absurd. How can you use a sample size of 1 to make a decision on an entire sport?
Also… Noemie Thomas is the real deal. If there’s one swimmer who could challenge for a 49-point in the fly, I think it’s her.
This year we may see Ryan Murphy move from the IM into the 50… or maybe the 100 fly. His breaststroke suuuucks. (compared to his other strokes… I would’ve been jazzed to ever swim a 58 breaststroke).
But he pretty convincingly beat ALL the Cal sprinters in the 100. Another year with Durden’s strength program should make him pretty quick.
And cool to see Will Hamilton doing well. I know a lot of people figured he was a one-hit wonder because he won the 200 fly his freshman year, but he has morphed into quite the IMer! Shows a good ability to adapt and try new things, rather than keep obsessing over your ‘best’ event’s times plateauing.
an underrated guy for sure. he can go from the 200fly to 200im to 200-500 free and apparently into breast, extremely versatile it seems.
Fact 1: Missy set the American record in the 200 yard freestyle.
Fact 2: Missy was a little off in long course this summer.
Fact 3: There are a number of factors that might account for Fact 2.
Fact 4: Not having complete knowledge of counterfactuals, we cannot say with 100% certainty what would have happened had Missy gone pro and/or trained elsewhere.
“Missy is not the same swimmer…” is an assertion, analysis, or an opinion.
Who cares about the 200 free yard she set?! LOL.
On Ledecky. Really good piece…
http://grantland.com/the-triangle/katie-ledecky-athlete-best-swimmer/
Omg I love grantland!!! I can’t believe they’ve finally started to write about Katie!!!! Thanks for informing us!!
REALLY great and very funny article! Thanks for sharing it! 🙂
Pol I don’t think you know swimming at all… How many national level swimmers developed in college before they went pro? Most. And how many even have the ability to go pro? Most won’t but they’ll have a degree from a university when they graduate. Without the college swimming environment there would be almost no pros in the US and in case you haven’t noticed we have the best swimmers in the world. And not everyone goal is to win an international medal.Your thought process is just very strange. Even for pros, swimming isn’t everything, and I’m sure they do enjoy their college experience!
And by the way even Ledecky, if she competes at college swimming that will be the end of career. She should think 100 times and should go pro.
Ledecky is not starting her college swimming at Stanford until after Rio. So you should chill.
chill out dude , your personnal expectation agenda has nothing to do with what those elite athletes are going through . Period .
By responding to Pol we are all giving him the attention he apparently wants, so my recommendation would be just to vote his comments down and ignore him!
Like on the Survivor TV show can we PLEASE vote POL and his/her comments off the island.
POL: Seriously get all negative with the NFL – leave USA Swimming & NCAA swimming alone to people who try care about it!
What the heck is your problem? Negative? You mean stating the facts? It is true that Missy is not the same swimmer anymore since she trained @ Cal/Teri.
If she gets back to the elite level and managed to win 6 golds again, then I’ll shut up.
And everyone knows that winning @ college level doesn’t mean anything. Hamilton and Li = King and Queen at the pool?! LOL. In college level. But they will never medal against the best in the world.
You do you, Pol. The kids in Berkeley aren’t losing sleep over your comments.
Roll on you bears! 🙂
They will. Especially for Franklin. If she can’t duplicate her performance from London and Barcelona. You know the deal.
So anything less than six golds is a failure??!! I have a feeling that you’ve never been an athlete on any level…
I believe Missy went personal bests in all of her events at NCAAs, even breaking an American Record along the way. Not exactly having a down year.