NCAA Major Conference Midseason Rankings

by Andrew Mering 12

December 30th, 2016 News

With all the mid season taper meets in the books, here’s a look at current conference ranks in the top D1 conferences. Using the Swimulator conference tool, I ran a simulations based on this seasons top times and last seasons top times as of 12/31/15 for the ACC, Big 10 Big 12, Pac 12, and SEC. Then I compared those to team’s actual scores at their conference meets.

The conference meet scores are often much larger because they include diving and several of these conferences score through 24 places instead of the 16 places used in Swimulator’s meets.

While the current top time rankings may over rate or under rate lots of teams, teams tend to follow similar approaches year to year to their in season meets. If a team was low ranked at this point last season but made a big jump at their conference meet last year, there’s a good chance it happens again. For example, the NC State men trail Louisville in this year’s ACC rankings by 26 points (594 to 568), but last year they trailed Louisville by 78 points (624 to 546) and ended up winning their conference by 334 points. Therefore, despite trailing currently, I think NC State is clearly the favorite to defend their ACC title.

On the other hand, the Tennessee women narrowly lost to Texas A&M at SEC’s last year (1166-1139). At mid season last year the Tennessee women were ranked 4th with 407 points, but currently they are 9th with 191 points. While they will probably move up the standings again at conference, contending to win this year would be a big surprise.

Here are the complete tables for each conference, men and women. The title links to the current year simulation if you want to look at the event by event break down. If there are any conferences not listed here you are interested in, try running your own simulations.

ACC Men:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Louisville 594 624 1067
NC State 568 546 1401
Virginia 498 377 737
Florida St 374 368 606
Notre Dame 303 159 677
Georgia Tech 282 275 776
UNC 230 272 897
Virginia Tech 214 236 892
Duke 207 312 643
Pittsburgh 82 165 345
Boston College 63 81 192

Big 12 Men:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Texas 1017 1041 1018
TCU 687 652 759
West Virginia 665 686 847

Big 10 Men:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Indiana 718 685 1304
Michigan 621 543 1475
Ohio St 503 486 1293
Minnesota 422 168 919
Wisconsin 341 489 832
Penn St 181 123 357
Michigan St 153 149 230
Northwestern 145 110 462
Iowa 137 317 515
Purdue 134 253 725

Pac 12 Men:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
California 730 762 628
Stanford 660 528 808
Arizona 541 646 569
Southern Cali 427 391 700
Arizona St 393 265 402
Utah 310 493 295

SEC Men:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Missouri 534 439 901
Georgia 509 561 1010
Alabama 464 414 915
Florida 434 532 909
LSU 307 205 526
Auburn 304 454 1223
Texas A&M 245 156 532
South Carolina 216 224 574
Tennessee 170 256 745
Kentucky 158 114 530

ACC Women:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Virginia 602 795 1332
NC State 509 343 1177
Louisville 504 510 1057
UNC 407 268 1079
Duke 294 308 642
Florida St 290 266 444
Virginia Tech 230 283 704
Notre Dame 190 194 537
Pittsburgh 172 234 425
Georgia Tech 135 98 355
Miami (FL) 82 116 502
Boston College 50 50 152

Big 12 Women:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Texas 992 1004 1043
Kansas 600 662 650
West Virginia 432 355 530
TCU 406 357 451
Iowa State 401 450 570

Big 10 Women:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Michigan 618 441 1360
Indiana 476 581 1207
Minnesota 473 160 927
Wisconsin 438 436 711
Ohio St 391 319 858
Iowa 204 210 369
Northwestern 180 114 467
Purdue 180 332 766
Rutgers 139 146 385
Penn St 136 433 687
Nebraska 102 190 411
Illinois 95 79 234
Michigan St 73 46 210

Pac 12 Women:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Stanford 717 571 1344
California 668 506 1305
Arizona 515 579 1124
Southern Cali 514 585 1480
UCLA 317 367 994
Utah 223 314 538
Arizona St 182 145 472
Washington St. 127 188 477
Oregon St 78 100 291

SEC Women:

Current Score Last Year 12/31 Score Actual Last Year Score (w/ Diving)
Georgia 683 614 1099
Texas A&M 586 500 1166
Missouri 422 301 763
Kentucky 343 202 619
Auburn 289 425 796
LSU 258 205 624
Alabama 211 184 485
Florida 195 337 754
Tennessee 191 407 1139
South Carolina 125 63 424
Arkansas 110 162 419
Vanderbilt 52 55 166

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Swimfans
7 years ago

C-USA rankings?

Wagwan
Reply to  Swimfans
7 years ago

Hahahahahaha

Swimfan
7 years ago

Would love to see C-USA rankings as well.

Konner Scott
7 years ago

Great article- love comparisons such as these. I would enjoy seeing the Ivy League rankings as well!

NM Coach
7 years ago

IU Men will win B1G Championship this year!

SUNY Cal
Reply to  NM Coach
7 years ago

I agree. IU men & MI women win BIG championships this year!

Cheeseburger
7 years ago

UNC men you sly dogs!! Throwing down BLISTERING times this fall, while remaining low in the rankings. NC state will have no clue what hit them once they take their dragsuits off for ACC’s

swimfan
Reply to  Cheeseburger
7 years ago

Dragsuits…. that’s cute

Porkchop2244
Reply to  Cheeseburger
7 years ago

I’ll bet my house that UNC doesn’t beat NC state in men again without a coaching change. That confident.

terry williams
Reply to  Cheeseburger
7 years ago

Duke will win the national championship. Go duke

Squeeps
Reply to  Cheeseburger
7 years ago

AGREED. UNC is throwing down some monstrous drag-suited swims this year. Many people disagree with Deselm’s in-season drag-suit racing tactics but it’s going to pay off big time in the end! If I were NC State, I would be very worried. Once those drag suits come off, they are a top 10 team in the NCAA for sure

ACC
7 years ago

Pretty sure the ACC scores top 24, which explains the discrepancy between the scores.