TCU Roars to NIC Men’s, Women’s Titles; UDel’s Currie Breaks CAA Record in the 200 Back

2024 NATIONAL INVITATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS

• March 14-16, 2024
• FAST, Ocala, Florida
• Short Course Yards (25 yards), prelims/finals
• Meet Central
• Day 1 recap
• Day 2 recap
• Full meet results

The TCU Horned Frogs roared to a final day victory at the 2024 NIC Championships, picking up four combined wins to sweep the men’s and women’s team titles on Saturday in Ocala.

The men wound up with a dominant victory, winning by 237.5 points ahead of Queens, while the women had their best day of the meet on Saturday to overcome Akron and win by 30.5.

Final Team Scores

Women’s Top 5:

1. TCU – 619
2. Akron – 588.5
3. Kentucky – 552
4. Queens – 438
5. UCSD – 421

Men’s Top 5:

1. TCU – 859
2. Queens – 621.5
3. Grand Canyon – 558.5
4. Oakland – 554
5. Kentucky – 521.5

Full team scores available in the Full meet results linked at the top

Akron’s women, who entered the day with a 34.5-point lead, got in the first blow toward the team battle on the day when Rebecca Reid won the 100 IM in a new Meet Record of 54.56. That race pushed their lead past 50 points.

TCU fought back in the 200 backstroke, even without the win. Torie Buerger from Kentucky won in a new best time of 1:54.59, but TCU had two in the top seven, led by Tania Qualgieri in 2nd place in 1:55.17.

The Horned Frogs picked up their first win of the meet in record-setting fashion when Nina Vadovicova won the 200 breaststroke in 2:10.65, setting a new Meet Record.

They finished the meet with one final win in the 400 free relay in 3:17.43 to seal the team title, including a 49.08 anchor leg from Olivia Rhodes.

The TCU men, meanwhile, entered the final day with a narrow 23-point lead ahead of Queens and blew the doors off, grabbing three event wins to stretch the final lead by another 200+ points.

That started with a win in the 1000 freestyle from 22-year-old sophomore Aaron Wilmes, though he couldn’t hold on for the distance double.

The distance freestyle races were swum as one event, but with points awarded for a swimmer’s rank at the 1000 yard mark and then at the final 1650 yard mark. This created a relatively-interesting race, where some swimmers were clearly going after the 1000 and then trying to hold on for the 1650.

Wilmes won the 1000 free in 9:14.94, about 1.3 seconds ahead of Seton Hall’s Clil Halevi. That’s Wilmes’ best 1000 free of the season. After that turn, though, he came off the gas a bit, while Halevi, who was out much slower than Wilmes (three seconds at the 200, four at the 400) had plenty left in the tank.

He had some of his best splits over the last 650, ultimately fighting past Halevi to win in 15:17.01. That was two seconds ahead of Wilmes’ runner-up 15:19.02.

TCU rolled from there. Geremia Freri won the 100 IM in 47.72, a new Meet Record, in the next race. Later in the session, Guilherme Camossato won the 200 breast in 1:54.78, about half-a-second ahead of Grand Canyon’s Jonathan Rom (1:55.35).

Queens didn’t have the depth to keep up with TCU on Saturday, but they still got in a few parting shots on the back of senior Matej Dusa. He first won the 100 free in 42.24, breaking his own Meet Record of 42.56 set last season. That swim was just .01 seconds shy of his lifetime best in the event.

That was his fourth win of the meet, and he wrapped up his racing with his fifth in the 400 free relay. There, he led off Queens in 42.64 as the Royals wrapped in 2:52.25, one more Meet Record to end the weekend.

Other Day 3 Winners & Notables:

• In the women’s 1000/1650 split race, UCSD’s Juli Arzave took both races. First she won the 1000 free in 9:53.66, two seconds ahead of Queens’ Sophie Lange. Lange was able to reel her in a bit over the last 650, but ultimately Arzave had just-enough left in the tank to hold on and win in 16:19.80. Lange was 2nd in 16:20.54. Later in the meet, Arazave’s teammate Asia Kozan picked up her second win of the meet, taking the 200 fly in 1:58.20.
• Delaware got their first win of the meet when Gavin Currie swam 1:41.69 to swim not only a personal best, but break the Delaware, CAA, and NIC Records in the race. A junior, Currie will be back next season and need to find just over a second in his senior year to earn an NCAA bid. He was one of a number of Delaware school records to fall on the day. Matthew Namakonov broke the 100 free record to win the B Final in 43.55, clearing the prelims record set by Addison Collins in 44.17. Victoria Novinskiy broke the school record in the women’s 200 back in finals in 1:58.76.
• The first and last championship tie of the meet came in the men’s 200 fly where Dartmouth’s Yan Dvoretskiy and Queens’ Yannick Plasil tied in 1:43.99. Dvoretskiy’s co-title came a day after breaking Dartmouth records in both the 100 fly and 400 free relay.