Courtesy: LSU Sports
BATON ROUGE, La. – After competing in various Olympic Trials across the globe over the last month, 11 Tigers have qualified for the 2024 Paris Olympics in their respective disciplines, becoming the largest group of athletes LSU Swimming and Diving has sent to the Summer Games in its history.
Four current Tigers have qualified for the Paris Olympics: Jere Hribar for Croatia, Sabrina Lyn for Jamaica, Helle Tuxen for Norway, and Jovan Lekic for Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The seven Tigers set to compete at the summer games that are not on the current roster at LSU are Maggie MacNeil for Canada, Lizzie (Cui) Roussel for New Zealand, Brooks Curry for the United States, Juan Celaya-Hernandez for Mexico, Pavel Alovatki for Moldova, Adrian Abadia Garcia for Spain, and Chiara Pellacani for Italy.
The largest number of LSU athletes who qualified for the Olympics before this year was five Tigers at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. The LSU representatives included Sion Brinn, Caroline Foot, Ruben Pineda, Guy Sandin, and Todd Torres.
In April, Hribar qualified for the 2024 Paris Olympics by clearing the A qualification standard in the 50-meter freestyle at the 2024 Speedo Canadian Swimming Open in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He is the fifth-fastest European swimmer.
Lyn, the Kingston, Jamaica native, secured her spot on the Jamaican Olympic Team in the 50-meter freestyle. In addition to Lyn’s qualification, Tuxen qualified for the Olympics and will compete for Norway on the three-meter springboard. Lekic will swim for Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 400-meter freestyle.
Former Tiger Maggie MacNeil, who won the Olympic gold medal in the 100-meter butterfly at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, is returning to defend her title in Paris. MacNeil qualified for the Canadian team again and will compete in the 100-meter fly and 4×100-meter medley relay at this year’s games.
Curry won the Olympic gold in Tokyo in the 4×100 freestyle relay. He qualified for the 2020 Paris Olympics in the U.S. Olympic Trials in the 4×200 freestyle relay.
Roussel was an LSU diver under coach Doug Shaffer from 2015 to 2019. She qualified for the Olympic Games on the three-meter springboard. Roussel and Tuxen are awaiting official invitations from their countries, which should be delivered this week.
Three former LSU divers are joining the likes of Tuxen and Roussel at the Olympics, including Celaya-Hernandez, who will compete in the three-meter synchronized dive. A participant in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Celaya-Hernandez returns to action in Paris after narrowly missing the podium, placing fourth in the three-meter synchronized dive.
Pellacani, who dove for LSU for two seasons, qualified for the Italian diving team in the three-meter individual and synchronized events. Garcia took an Olympic redshirt during the second season to focus on training for Paris and qualified in the three-meter synchronized dive for his native Spain.
Alovatki, who also took the 2023-24 collegiate season off to train for the Olympics, qualified for Moldova in the 400-meter freestyle.
The 2024 Paris Olympics begin Friday, July 26, and conclude Sunday, Aug. 11. The swimming events start Saturday, July 27, with the 100-meter butterfly starting at 4:00 a.m. CT.
Congrats Tigers! Give ’em some fishbowl in Paris.