Ohio State DQ’ed From 200 Medley Relay 24 Hours Later at Big Tens

2018 WOMEN’S B1G TEN CHAMPIONSHIPS

There was a bit of controversy at the beginning of the Women’s B1G Championships concerning the Ohio State 200 medley relay. While reaction times showed that both Michigan and Ohio State’s 200 medley relays should have been disqualified, points were awarded to OSU for that relay, while the Michigan relay was still disqualified and awarded no points.

The live results show that the OSU breaststroker Hanna Gresser registered a -.09 exchange, while Michigan anchor Daria Pyshnenko was -.06 on her exchange. Read the NCAA rules on relay disqualification below, from Article 6c (page 41 of the rulebook):

If the electronic relay takeoff equipment detects an exchange differential (takeoff pad time minus finish pad time) of –0.09 through +0.09 second inclusive from the manufacturer’s starting point, the decision(s) of the human judge(s) shall not be considered. The determination of the electronic relay takeoff equipment shall be official, with exchange differential of –0.09 through –0.01 second from the manufacturer’s starting point indicating a rules violation and values of 0.00 through +0.09 second indicating a legitimate relay exchange.

According to this rule, both relays should have been disqualified, without the ability for an official to overrule, unless there was evidence (per a video review) that the touch pads/electronic takeoff equipment were faulty.

There was some confusion and various stories floating around on deck about the DQ against OSU not ending up being counted, which would be a 54 point swing in the Buckeyes’ favor. The Big Ten issued a statement, seen below, stating that while the OSU relay was disqualified Wednesday night, the “disqualification was not administered correctly.” The championship committee then voted to officially enforce the disqualification on Thursday afternoon, meaning that both the Michigan and OSU 200 medley relays from Wednesday night will both be disqualified in accordince with NCAA rules and the relay exchange times noted in the live results.

BIG TEN STATEMENT:

During the 200-medley relay at the Big Ten Women’s Swimming & Diving Championships on Wednesday night, Ohio State’s relay was disqualified by the technology on site but the disqualification was not administered correctly. After a review of NCAA and Big Ten policies, the championship committee voted on Thursday afternoon to enforce the disqualification from the relay. 

The decision is final and team scores have been adjusted accordingly.

This week’s Big Ten Championships are currently being held at the McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion at Ohio State University.

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Terrible
6 years ago

How humiliating it must be to have the time and recognition taken away over a day later… does the 15 minute rule no longer exist? The break following the race was taken to finalize the Michigan DQ, if they were going to DQ OSU why did the officials not do it then? Completely unfair to protest in a coaches meeting a whole 12-hours later.

anon
6 years ago

Good for them. At least their committee did the right thing. At our CIF semifinals, USA Swimming officials manually changed a swimmers time by over 3 full seconds (3.09 to be exact) to get a USA Swimming official’s athlete into the finals knocking my daughter out. We filed a protest and the committee decided that since my daughter was swimming other events in the finals, the event she was cheated out of didn’t matter. It mattered to her!

Admin
Reply to  anon
6 years ago

Without knowing your child’s precise situation, on a surface level it sounds like they followed the proper procedure. There are guidelines as to when the touch-pad time should be used, and when the backup times should be use. A 3 second gap between the touchpad and the backup times (if the backup times all agreed) seems like a touchpad malfunction.

anon
Reply to  Braden Keith
6 years ago

Actually, there was no pad malfunction. If there was, the meet would have stopped and a backup pad installed. There were three heats in this 100 yard breast event. At the end of the third heat, during the next event, the girls coach was called to the officials table and asked what time she got for her swimmer. This coach told my daughters coach that she told admin she didn’t get a time, but her swimmer was right behind the other girl. The girl with the altered time swam in heat #2. This meet had touch pads, pickles and stop watches (3 timers on each lane) but the officials asked the coach what time she got! They kept her in… Read more »

Taa
Reply to  anon
6 years ago

since I read all of this I have to ask: did the girl that was moved into finals finish 3 seconds behind her prelim time or did she swim a time close to her prelim time? That would ultimately prove if your argument is correct or not.

anon
Reply to  Taa
6 years ago

Actually she swam over a second slower than the falsified time and about 2 seconds faster than her actual prelim time. This proves nothing since a lot of swimmers have different margins between semifinals and finals which were held a week apart. Even Andi Murez improved over five seconds, one year, between her semifinals and finals during her 200 free.

LAUSD has their own CIF section because they are a huge district with over 50 high schools with swim teams. At the time, the top 24 times would advance to semifinals and then the top 12 would advance to finals. The times in the heats were drastically different. Heat #1 had a difference of 7 seconds between swimmers, heat… Read more »

Vst5911
Reply to  anon
6 years ago

Time adjustments do not have to be identified on posted meet results in many LSCs. They will however be filed in official meet results kept by the host. Often with a missed DQ they just show as revised. There are procedures for making adjustments including when they are permissible and who must sign off. Most are all done within meet manager and follow a specific procedure. Times are flagged when there is at least .30 discrepancy between pad and plunger to allow computer operators to be alert to a potential error. It is definitely possible for a 3 second error or even greater(soft touch, late touch, timer missing the plunger etc) . Adjustments don’t always mean a touchpad is malfunctioning… Read more »

anon
Reply to  Vst5911
6 years ago

When there is more than a .30 difference the rules state: add the differences between pad and intermediate button time (excluding the malfunctioning lane); Divide that number by the number of valid lanes (excluding the malfunctioning lane) to determine an average; the digits after hundredths are dropped leaving a timing system difference; Add the timing system difference to the valid back up time for the malfunctioning lane (this will be the official time). Nowhere does it say to call the athletes coach to the admin table and ask them what time they clocked for their athlete especially when there are touch pads, pickles, stop watches, and three timers in each lane.

Bottom line, they were caught cheating and CIF/LAUSD representative’s… Read more »

Vst5911
Reply to  anon
6 years ago

That is your bottom line based on what best serves your version of events. You have read the USA swimming rule book deeming you an expert on time adjustments. Comments from a representative don’t mean anything unless there were actual rules broken. I’ve heard officials say lots of things to coaches and swimmers/parents when unsuccessfully trying to make them feel better for a disappointment. Hopefully your child has moved on and you can too.

anon
Reply to  Vst5911
6 years ago

You don’t seem to get it. There were rules broken – lots of rules broken. This was one of many complaints taken to SCS review board. But wait there’s more, The hearing officer, Ed Duncan (USC announcer, former SCS board member, former USA Swimming BOR member) got pissed when this particular matter came up and stated that it wasn’t a USA Swimming matter because it was only an observed meet and not a sanctioned meet by USA Swimming. Also, one of the computer personnel who worked this meet in question was on the panel of this review board.

I don’t claim to be an expert on time adjustments, but I did ask an expert who told me what to ask… Read more »

anon
Reply to  anon
6 years ago

And, at the National Board of Review level, Jill Chasson denied the appeal siding with SCS that the CIF meet was not sanctioned or run by either SCS or USA Swimming even though the meet was “observed” and the falsified time was entered into SWIMS and the three member Computer personnel were affiliated with USA Swimming – 2 being on the various boards of SCS.

Jill Chasson should have recused herself because some of the complaints involved individuals affiliated with FAST. Mike Chasson, Jill’s husband, is on the Board of Directors of Fast and was the head coach for ASU (Pac-10 team). A couple of months before the CIF incident, our club team was asked to time for the PAC-10… Read more »

Vst5911
Reply to  anon
6 years ago

You are still going…..wow. One quick correction reaction judging pads (RJP) were unplugged but not the actual timing pads. Details like this matter when making such an impassioned and days long argument to complete strangers and unrelated to the OSU DQ itself which was the subject matter. I do not know any of the parties you mention but regret attempting to clarify admin/computer procedures. Good luck to you.

anon
Reply to  Vst5911
6 years ago

My first comment was simple. I’m sorry my responses to your comments ANGERED you. Good luck to you to!

Chris Robert Barley
6 years ago

Fair enough. *ichigan still sucks

Jackman
Reply to  Chris Robert Barley
6 years ago

Look at the scoreboard

gator
6 years ago

Was there video review of the call by the officials? Big Ten Champs are lightly staffed with officials in comparison to other D1 swimming conference championships, which may have contributed to the error in this case.

swimmmer
6 years ago

Is there zero margin of error with the take off pads?

Tea rex
6 years ago

I thought anything as fast as -0.03 was legal if not called at the time by an official. I guess that has changed?

Noexplode
Reply to  Tea rex
6 years ago

Omega is calibrated differently

Right Dude Here
Reply to  Tea rex
6 years ago

Different meets have different rules, some of them are head-scratchingly dumb.

sven
Reply to  Tea rex
6 years ago

That’s FINA. Guess the NCAA doesn’t make that distinction.

honestly
6 years ago

Thank god that the article clarified the dq as I had originally thought that they were dq’d for having a steroid user Chinese national on the relay.

SVIRD
Reply to  honestly
6 years ago

What a hateful and prejudiced comment. Go away.

ex quaker
Reply to  SVIRD
6 years ago

I don’t think it’s fair to call it prejudiced considering Li has actually tested positive before and the Chinese have a strong history of systematic doping policy.

meeeeee
Reply to  honestly
6 years ago

No human is illegal

ex quaker
Reply to  meeeeee
6 years ago

Sure, but in the world of sports, performance enhancing drugs are.

Hahaha
6 years ago

Hmm. It’s funny to me that the committee decided to go back a full 24 hours later and make this change… human error is part of the game, you can’t go back a full 24 hours later in any sport, if that were the case then what’s the point of having human officials. That’s just not how it works (and the rules say 15 minutes btw). Imagine if we went back days later in the superbowl and decided a TD was incomplete, is it right to take away the win? No of course not, it was human error on the call. In this occasion, the human error worked in favor for OSU. And Michigan got the DQ. This is taking… Read more »

Admin
Reply to  Hahaha
6 years ago

Hahaha – that’s actually not true. In every sport, they can go back and review administrative errors. They cannot go back and review and change human errors. In this case, it’s what is defined in the sports world as an “administrative error.”

For example, if a player was removed from an NBA game for 6 fouls, but they had only committed 5, and they protested, the rest of the game would be replayed if correct. This exact thing actually happened in an NBA game in 2008: http://www.espn.com/nba/news/story?id=3192421

There’s not a common equivalent in the NFL, and I’m not an expert on the nuance of NFL rules, but if, for example, an official administered a… Read more »

Hahaha
Reply to  Braden Keith
6 years ago

Let’s not forget about the 15 minute overturn rule…

Admin
Reply to  Hahaha
6 years ago

This is true. We don’t know – and nobody is saying – whether the appeal was written within the 15 minute rule.

Hahaha
Reply to  Braden Keith
6 years ago

Regardless of when the appeal was written, there is a distinct rule in the handbook stating that it must be settled by the end of the session of which the race being contested was swum. Meaning that no matter what, it cannot be overturned any later than Wednesday night. (Which it was)

Right Dude Here
Reply to  Hahaha
6 years ago

Big if true

anon
Reply to  Hahaha
6 years ago

Do people really want to win because of human error? Should others lose because of human error? At least the NFL has instant replays. Nobody wants to be cheated. So they lost a third place medal they didn’t deserve. I’ll bet the fourth place team is ecstatic.

About Karl Ortegon

Karl Ortegon

Karl Ortegon studied sociology at Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT, graduating in May of 2018. He began swimming on a club team in first grade and swam four years for Wesleyan.

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