Old national caliber swimmers that never come back
Former Member
Interesting and unfortunate that the vast majority of ex swimmers that made finals at NCAAs or Nationals when they were younger (or even just cuts) do not now participate in Masters Swimming. Only a small handful of these people come to Masters Nationals each year within each age group.
What a good opportunity USMS presents to see old faces and have a good time. I think USMS would benefit tremendously from their knowledge of the sport.
John Smith
Former Member
Most are grossly out of shape and have a distaste for the sport. I wouldn't worry about it.
John Smith
Originally posted by TheGoodSmith
Most are grossly out of shape and have a distaste for the sport. I wouldn't worry about it.
John Smith No worries. I am in no danger of winning any events anytime soon.
The Big Ten Conference has been the most successful conference in history in the NCAA Championship Meet. Of the 82 NCAA Championships that have been held, 39 team championships have been awarded to the Conference. Of the 39 the breakdown is as follows: Michigan 18, Ohio State 11, Indiana 6, and Northwestern 4, for a total of 39. Of the 43 Championships not won by the Big Ten Conference are as follows: USC 9, Texas 9, Stanford 8, Auburn 5, Yale 4, Cal 2, Florida 2, Navy 2, Tennesse 1, and UCLA 1 for a total of 43 NCAA Championships. This information comes from the NCAA website. I didn't even bother to go through the individual titles but it appears that the Big Ten has more than half of those.
Its true the Big Ten has not won an NCAA title since 1995, so most of these Championships were in the earlier years. The Big Ten remains the most active conference with 21 of 22 schools having programs for both Men and Women. The only program dropped so far is the Illinois Men from the conference.
Well, two follow ups to this.
First, 10 years ago the Big Ten had won 39/72 championships in swimming.
Second, we all know why Illinois dropped swimming. It's because 10 baseball playing teenagers in the state believe swimmers are gay. That, in turn, caused the state to drop swimming from their flagship institution.
When did the Big Ten get 22 schools?
Originally posted by TheGoodSmith
Texas rarely if ever has recruited foreign swimmers for their mens collegiate swim team.
John Smith And I thought Texans considered anyone who wasn’t from the great state a foreigner.
Well, the South like Arizona and California and Texas recruits across the US and foreign countries. I think the way swimming is today that the club teams have less influence past high school. Think 35 years ago, the club teams got the college swimmers in the summer time. This past summer nationals, the college teams had club versions for non-school part of the year. There was Longhorn made up of several college and some high school folks. Club Wolverang, the university of Michiagan at Ann Arbor with Mr Phelps.
Geek:
I meant 22 programs from 11 schools. Remeber Penn State joined but they did not rename the conference to the Big 11. And its been dry for a while with NCAA Championships. Maybe Bob Bowman can change that in the future.
About your second point, I will leave that up to Craigh. I don't think he will agree with your statement because I believe when he was thinking like this he was referring to young boys and wearing speedo's.
Mr Goodsmith, didn't Texas recruit some foreign divers while you attended the school. I know its not swimming, but they do contribute to the points for the Championship. Also I have been thinking about what your saying about ex National Caliber swimmers from the past and I believe we have really had a lot come back and compete at one time or another. Maybe not consistantly but they make a presence. What % do you believe would be a representation for that.
I have a teamate from Michigan Masters that swam at the 1989 Pan Pacific Championships and in his heat there was 3 people that had won 9 Olympic Gold Medals. Rowdy Gaines, Jim Montgomery, and Brain Goodell were all in the same heat in the 200 Free. Also another teammate of mine went to the Short Course Nationals at USC in 1990 and couldn't believe all of the National caliber swimmers at the meet. In his heats in backstroke he had Mook Rodenbaugh, Clay Britt, Sean Murphy, and Fran Mortensen just to name a few. Mr Goodsmith, you might have been at this meet because I believe all of these guys are in your age group. My teammate commented that it reminded him of heats of the Olympic Trials.
There are 156 ex Olympians that have swam masters that USMS knows about. Gail Roper keeps track of this on this website and there is probably a lot more. It would be interesting if someone would trace back all of the national swimmers that have swam up until this point. I think there is a lot more that you could imagine.
