2020 INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING LEAGUE – SEMIFINAL #2
- Sunday, November 15th: 6-8pm CET/11-1pm U.S. Central
- Monday, November 16th: 6-8pm CET/11-1pm U.S. Central
- Duna Arena – Budapest, Hungary
- Short Course Meters (SCM) format
- ISL Technical Handbook
- 2020 ISL Scoring Format
- 2020 ISL Prize Money and Bonuses
- How To Watch
- Omega Results
- Teams: Cali Condors / LA Current / Iron / Toronto Titans
The skins events for Semi-final #2 of the 2020 International Swimming League playoffs have been chosen, with the Cali Condors and LA Current going back to their reliable skins choices for Monday.
For the 3rd time this season, the Condors and Current are facing off, and for the 3rd time this season, the Condors chose breaststroke and Current chose backstroke as the men’s skins events in those matchups.
2020 ISL Semifinal #2 Skins Choices
- Women – Breaststroke (Cali Condors)
- Men – Backstroke (LA Current)
The winners of the medley relays on day 1 of each ISL meet this season gets to chose the stroke for the 50 meter ‘skins’ event on day 2. In the skins event, each team enters 2 swimmers into the opening round for 8 total entrants. The 4 best swimmers advance to the semi-final 3 minutes later, and the 2 best advance to the final 3 minutes later. Points, and money, are awarded in each round.
2020 ISL Semifinal #2 Team Standings After Day 1
- Cali Condors – 282
- LA Current – 255
- Iron – 173
- Toronto Titans – 171
Ultimately, this will be about bragging rights and MVP standings – Cali Condors and LA Current should be locked in to the top 2 spots by the time the ‘skins’ event comes around, which is where they need to be to advance to the final next weekend.
The Cali Condors remained undefeated in the women’s medley relay all-time in ISL history on Sunday, beating LA Current by more than a second.
While Lilly King‘s once-indomitable results have softened a little, the swimmer who has beaten her in two-straight meets in the 50 breaststroke is her teammate Molly Hannis.
Nobody has been able to beat King through the 3-round ‘skins’ format, where she’s still the best in the league. This allows Cali to set up a scenario where Hannis is aggressive in the opening round to maximize Jackpot points, while King works for the round 3 win.
Those two won’t be totally unchallenged. Iron’s Ida Hulkko was just .05 seconds behind King in 3rd place, but LA Current are weak in the 50 breaststroke as their two best breaststrokers are 200 meter specialists. In the race-within-the-race, that means low risk.
As for the Current, they’ll run with 3-for-3 in Jackpots Ryan Murphy. He won the 50 backstroke individually on Sunday in 22.76. While Coleman Stewart was just .08 behind, and Guilherme Basseto was only another .09 behind him, and Shane Ryan lurks dangerously, Murphy has only once been seriously challenged in the final of the skins format: by Ryosuke Irie of Tokyo, who swam in the other semi-final.
