How Did the Men’s NCAA Championship Cut-Lines Move in 2024?

2024 MEN’S NCAA SWIMMING AND DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS

Much like we saw on the women’s side, an unusually-high number of men’s events saw slower invites in 2024 than they did in 2013.

Four men’s races (200 free, 500 free, 1650 free, 200 breast) saw cutlines get slower, while the invite time for the 200 back was exactly the same as last year.

Unsurprisingly, the men’s breaststrokes didn’t move much. The “A” final of last year’s 100 breaststroke was made up of five 5th year swimmers and three seniors. While there was more youth in the 200, it was still generally a veteran race, with four 5th years and six seniors among the 16 All-Americans in the event.

In the men’s distance freestyles, while there were a lot of underclassmen among the qualifiers last year, a lot of those aren’t swimming this year – especially thanks to Mark Schubert’s The Swim Team distance group, which has pulled a lot of them out of the collegiate system to train for the Olympics.

Among the underclassmen who are redshirting in this group are the defending NCAA Champion in the 1650 free Will Gallant and NCAA Champion in the 500 free David Johnston. Others, like Wisconsin’s Jake Newmark, didn’t qualify for this year’s meet after finishing 4th in the 500 free last year.

In short: it’s just kind of a funky year for the men’s distance free, and there are enough familiar faces missing to move the line.

Men’s NCAA Invited Times Through the Years

EVENT (SCY) 2020 INVITE TIME 2021 INVITE TIME 2022 INVITE TIME 2023 INVITE TIME 2024 Invite Time Change
50 free 19.32 19.46 19.28 19.21 19.13 -0.08
100 free 42.57 42.88 42.34 42.32 42.19 -0.13
200 free 1:34.07 1:34.04 1:33.08 1:32.85 1:32.93 +0.08
500 free 4:16.49 4:16.75 4:14.96 4:14.36 4:14.90 +0.54
1650 free 14:57.07 15:01.33 14:55.21 14:53.54 14:54.92 +1.38
100 fly 45.97 46.29 45.57 45.57 45.37 -0.20
200 fly 1:43.18 1:43.47 1:42.42 1:42.57 1:42.10 -0.47
100 back 46.22 46.37 45.87 45.7 45.56 -0.14
200 back 1:41.49 1:41.81 1:40.92 1:40.62 1:40.62
100 breast 52.46 52.40 52.20 51.90 51.89 -0.01
200 breast 1:54.03 1:54.28 1:53.23 1:52.94 1:53.12 +0.28
200 IM 1:43.79 1:44.15 1:43.36 1:43.14 1:43.05 -0.09
400 IM 3:44.36 3:45.67 3:43.50 3:42.99 3:42.93 -0.06

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PBJSwimming
7 months ago

Deleted for formatting issues.

Last edited 7 months ago by PBJSwimming
Old Bruin
7 months ago

Well to be fair, you just fact checked for them so

Andrew
7 months ago

incoming patented seeliger finals choke in all his events

Real
Reply to  Andrew
7 months ago

This is the second seelinger choke comment by Andrew. Top tier hating

bryan
7 months ago

4:02 500 free leon marchand

Joe
7 months ago

I don’t think Sandidge or Hobson are redshirting…

Diehard
7 months ago

Did anyone score out the men’s meet?

MarshFAN
Reply to  Diehard
7 months ago

It will be scored in two or three weeks – Guaranteed!

snailSpace
7 months ago

Mixing up Zalan’s first name with Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s is a nice easter egg.

25Back
Reply to  snailSpace
7 months ago

Bobby Finke didn’t actually forgo his 5th year to go pro, it was because he heard Zlatan Sarkany was coming to the NCAA and retired from SCY out of fear…

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Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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