NCAC Swimming & Diving Championships Central
This Week's Outlook: The College of Wooster men's and women's swimming and diving teams travel to Denison University for the four-day 2022 North Coast Athletic Conference Championships. Wednesday's session starts at 6 p.m. On Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, preliminaries start at 9:30 a.m., with finals set to start at 6 p.m. The NCAC scores 27 places in individual events at the conference championships.
Spectator Policy: Spectators are not permitted at the NCAC Swimming & Diving Championships, per a release from the conference office on Monday, January 24. This is to enable full squads from all conference teams full participation in the championship meet without any reduction in competitors. Teams will be spaced out appropriately throughout the entire facility, including the spectator seating areas, in order to de-densify the amount of people on the deck at any one time.
Media Coverage: Fans can follow along through the available livestream and live stats as found on the NCAC Swimming & Diving Championships webpage. Fans can also follow the swimming and diving team's Twitter account @WooSwimDive for live updates.
Last Time Out: Wooster sprinted past Oberlin College on January 29, with the men taking the dual meet finale 176-77 and the women coasting to a 163-79 victory. With the women's victory, Wooster sent its seniors out with three unblemished dual meet records and an overall ledger of 31-1. The win also marked the seventh time in the last eight seasons Wooster's women have not dropped a dual meet against a NCAC program.
2020 NCAC Championships Recap: Kenyon College won its first men's league title since 2008 and its league-leading 24th overall crown, while Denison women topped the team standings for the 10th time, and first since 2017. Wooster placed fifth in both the men's and women's standings.
On the men's side, then-sophomore Eric Jacques (Columbus, Ohio/Wellington) earned All-NCAC honors with third-place finishes on the 1- (415.80 points) and 3-meter (363.85) boards. Alumni Josh Gluck, Craig Klumpp, Trey Schopen, and Wyatt Foss were elevated to an all-conference spot in the 400 medley relay (3:28.99). The time was originally fifth at the meet, then Denison was disqualified for an early takeoff, and later Kenyon was sidelined for a stroke infraction.
Then-sophomore Molly Likins (St. Clair, Mich./St. Clair) earned four all-conference honors at the meet. On relays, alumnae Hannah Langer, Heidi Likins, and Brooke Brown teamed with Molly Likins for a 1:46.47 in the 200 medley relay. Alumnae Kate Murphy, Anne Bowers, and Lexi Riley-DiPaolo joined Likins on the 400 medley relay, with the time of 3:55.70 ranking third. Individually, Likins' 1:02.61 was third in the 100 breaststroke, and in prelims, she lowered her school record to 1:02.58, which was the seventh-fastest time in Div. III in 2020.
Then-junior Madison Whitman (Wooster, Ohio/Wooster), who is back this year for a fifth year, broke the program record in the 200 breaststroke at 2:19.06. Whitman placed second at the 2020 NCAC Championships, with Likins taking third with a time of 2:20.88. Whitman went on to lower her school to 2:18.30 at the Kenyon Invitational, with that marking the 12th-fastest Div. III time in 2020, while her second-place conference finish was the best by a Scot in an individual event since 2014.
Of note, Whitman and Likins earning all-conference honors in the same event marked a first for the program since Caitlin McNulty and Julie Pinzur did so on the 3-meter diving board at the 2007 NCAC meet.
The Winningest: Wooster head coach Rob Harrington has enjoyed a milestone-filled season. He scored dual meet win No. 250 at Wooster during the Fighting Scots' sweep over Baldwin Wallace University on January 14. Eight days later, Wooster swept Hiram College and Ohio Wesleyan University, giving Harrington 254 career dual meet wins, and moving him past Keith Beckett, who guided the Scots to 253 dual meet wins from 1984-2003, for the most in program history.
"All I Do Is Win": DJ Khaled released a song in 2010 titled "All I Do Is Win" and all first-year Ollie Bream (Pinehurst, Texas/Firbank Grammar School (Australia)) has done is win in her young college career. Bream claimed first in all three of her individual events at the midseason Wooster Invitational, taking the 200 individual medley (2:09.80), the 400 individual medley (4:39.53), and the 200 butterfly (2:05.08), with the butterfly time ranking as a NCAA Div. III "B" cut. In dual meets, Bream won 19 of the 20 individual events she was entered in this season.
Pearson Leads Way for Men's Team: Sophomore Josh Pearson (Cincinnati, Ohio/Indian Hill) is Wooster's No. 1 swimmer on the men's side, evidenced by holding the program records in the 200 individual medley (1:53.86) and 400 individual medley (4:03.05) heading into this week's championships. Pearson appears on the program's top-10 leaderboard in eight of the 15 tracked individual swimming events.
Scots Rake in NCAC Honors: Wooster has collected four NCAC Athlete of the Week honors. Sophomore Emma Connors (Moon Twp., Pa./Moon Area) and Pearson swept the honors on the opening week of the season (October 4). That week, Connors was a triple winner as the Scots knocked off Cleveland State University at the season-opening Viking Relay Challenge. Connors anchored Wooster's winning 500 freestyle relay (4:52.44), led off the winning 3x500 freestyle relay (16:30.61), and was part of the first-place 200 freestyle relay (1:41.51). Pearson logged a trio of third-place finishes at the Viking Relay Challenge. The sophomore anchored the 200 butterfly relay (1:38.54) and 3x500 freestyle relay (15:10.51). He also led off Wooster's 400 individual medley relay that finished at 3:53.10. His leadoff leg of 55.67 in the 400 individual medley relay marked a lifetime best, and at the time was the fourth-fastest in program history.
First-year Hallie Findlan (Jefferson Hills, Pa./Thomas Jefferson) won Wooster's next NCAC Athlete of the Week honor on November 15. Findlan won four events during Wooster's win over Westminster College (Pa.), starting with the 400 medley relay (4:12.19) that cleared second-place by over five seconds. Her time of 24.53 in the 50 freestyle was the best by nearly two seconds, while her winning effort of 54.09 in the 100 freestyle was nearly three seconds faster than the runner-up time. Findlan was part of Wooster's winning 200 freestyle relay (1:44.96), with that quartet having an over four-second cushion from the runner-up time.
Bream was the latest NCAC Athlete of the Week, with her honor coming on January 17. Bream posted gold performances in the 200 individual medley (2:15.58), the 200 butterfly (2:14.45), and 400 medley relay (4:12.05) in the Baldwin Wallace dual meet.
A Timken Record Falls: Senior Doak Schultz (Mystic, Conn./Osbourn Park (Va.)) capped the dual meet season with a 54.34 in the 100 individual medley. That marked a new Timken Natatorium record in the recently-added event.