The Indiana men graduated their top sprint freestyler, US National Teamer Zach Apple, off a 400 free relay that finished 4th at last year’s NCAA Championship meet, but early returns on the 2019-2020 season indicate that the Indiana sprint group hasn’t missed a beat.
As part of a 171-129 win over the Louisville Cardinals on Friday evening on the road in Louisville, Indiana swam a 2:52.84. That’s the fastest time nationally by a non-invite relay this season, bumping NC State’s 2:53.27 done last weekend against rivals Virginia. It’s also the 16th-fastest relay done by any team in the country during the current NCAA season.
Indiana Hoosiers 400 Free Relay Splits:
- Bruno Blaskovic, junior – 43.76
- Mohamed Samy, senior – 43.22
- Van Mathias, sophomore – 43.01
- Jack Franzman, sophomore – 42.85
Franzman’s team-leading split of 42.85 is already almost as fast as the 42.21 that he swam at last year’s NCAA Championship meet. This relay was accomplished without using freshman Brendan Burns, who split 42.6 on the team’s mid-season A relay. Burns split 44.71 on the “B” relay leadoff leg. He and Mathias will be battling for the right to replace the now-graduated Apple come championship season.
Indiana is in the very-early stages of its final preparations for the Big Ten Championships, which for the men will run February 26th-29th in their home pool in Bloomington.
Sprint freestyle was once the Achilles heel of the Indiana men’s team, but after bringing in consecutively Dennis Dale from Minnesota and Coley Stickels, now the head coach at Alabama, to rebuild the sprint group, that is a story of the past.
The Indiana men rank 4th in the country overall this season thanks to a 2:50.11 done at their mid-season invite. That’s .55 seconds slower than they were a year earlier at their mid-season invite.
What’s new, just swim swam raving about IU all the time
What’s new, just commenters hating on IU all the time
Yes we write about Indiana a lot. We also write a lot about Texas, UVA, NC State, Cal, Stanford, Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, Auburn, Michigan, etc. etc.
As it turns out, we write a lot about swimming. 🤷♂️ if that’s offensive to you, maybe head over to ESPN or Yahoo Sports or somewhere. They rarely write about swimming, so maybe you’ll be less triggered there.
Thank you for covering our sport!
Man.. unprofessional. Could have left it as the first paragraph.
Brandon Hamblin with a very impressive 43.8 on the second leg of the B relay
Franzman was 41.5 flying start on the relay at last year’s Big Tens
Coley effect.
Dang. Terrific in-season effort. I’m not *that* old and I remember Texas setting a national record and winning NCAAs in 2:52.
Pedestrian.
Jonty effect
Speaking of Jonty… is he staying at IU after this season?
Doesn’t look like he’s on the deck with the team from that race video. Could just be he was elsewhere at the time?
He usually watches from the stands, or films the races himself. He could have been the one who filmed this video
Sounds like you know something…care to enlighten?
Andrej Barna really put in some work with that 42.85 on the second leg
Neat