’12-’13 Previews: Jason Schnur Starred For No. 12 Ohio State as Tim Phillips Trained for London

Key Losses: Andrew Elliott (12 NCAA Points, 5 NCAA relays), Lincoln Fahrbach (3 NCAA relays), Brent Hitchcock (1 NCAA relay), Markus Sievers (NCAA qualifier)

Key Additions: Josh Fleagle (OH – freestyle), Andrew Brower (OH – breaststrokes), Chris DePietro (OH – IM), David Morgan (FL – Short Breast/IM)

2011-2012 Look Back: This Ohio State men’s team learned a lot about themselves in 2012. They lost one National Teamer to graduation in Elliott Keefer, and they lost another to a redshirt as Tim Phillips took the year off to train in Charlotte for the Olympics.

But this team, even after losing two stars, was able to find new leadership. They got big, big contributions from new swimmers, and had good progress from their 21-strong freshman class last season.

All indications are that Phillips will return next season, which will really make a huge impact for this team, especially given how many relay pieces they are graduating. He will replace Lincoln Fahrbach on both the butterfly leg of the medley relay and on the free relays, after Fahrbach filled in admirably last year (he focused only on relays at NCAA’s).

With two years of eligibility left, Phillips returns as one of the top swimmers in the collegiate ranks. Before leaving to focus on Olympic preparations, he was already a 43.3 in the 100 free and a 45.9 in the 100 fly. At the Olympic Trials, he missed his taper a bit and didn’t go a best time in his fly, but we can only assume that he will be at least to his old times when he returns to yards. He’s one of the few swimmers in the country who has the potential to upset the Tom Shields 100 back/100 fly double on day 2 of NCAA’s this year.

Relay Focus: Ohio State men’s head coach Bill Wadley has shown a preference to focus on relays at NCAA’s. He’s more-than-once scratched top swimmers from individual races to focus on them (Phillips dropped the 100 free in 2011, for example). Despite big losses, next season’s relays will still be outstanding.

That’s in part because of the explosion of Jason Schnur last season. He placed 10th in the 100 free and a stunning 3rd in the 50, including a 19.30 in prelims. With the graduation of Texas’ Jimmy Feigen, Vlad Morozov of USC is the only remaining sprinter in the country who is really elite on an international level. Having one of the best sprinters as their anchor will give the Buckeyes a lot of confidence handing off to him. As mentioned, Phillips’ freestyle skill almost matches that in his fly, at least in short course.

The free relays will be rounded out by two other seniors: Zach Holmes and Zach Birnbrich. Both split 19-highs on the 200 free relay, but the Buckeyes really need some help in the 400 free relay. Even with a 42.7 from Schnur, they finished 17th and didn’t score at NCAA’s. But with Phillips taking over the leadoff from Fahrbach, that relay projects to a 2:53-mid, which moves them toward top-8 territory. If incoming freshman Josh Fleagle develops quickly, he could grab free relay spots in his first season as well.

In the medleys, the Buckeyes graduate their backstroke and butterfly legs. Fly is an easy replacement – Phillips can hop right into that spot. Ohio State could go a lot of different ways on the backstroke. Sophomore Steven Zimmerman had a great freshman season in the 200 backstroke, where he was a 1:43.3 at Big Tens. His best in the 100, though, is just a 48.1, as he prefers to slide into the IM’s as his second and third individuals. That means the duties will likely fall to junior Kevin Lancki. He was a bit under-rested at Big Tens last year, but at a last chance meet the next week he swam a 47.5 in the 100.

The 200 and 400 medleys placed 9th and 10th at NCAA’s last year, respectively, and with the changes they’ll see this year, they should be able to bump up into the bottom part of the A-Final if all goes according to plan.

Bubb’s About Face: Perhaps one of the most underrated individual-swimmer coaching jobs last season came out of this Ohio State team and sophomore Ryan Bubb. He came to the Buckeyes as a sprint freestyler – having been a 20.6 in high school. But somehow, the coaches saw potential in him as a 200 butterflier (show me another swimmer who has ever made that transition). As a freshman, despite having not swum the race since he was 15, Bubb showed immediate potential. By the end of his sophomore year, he had a best of 1:44 and heads into next season on target to finish top-8 at Big Tens.

That transition is not an easy one to make, so don’t be surprised if he dips even lower next season as he is incredibly strong. Given the combination of events, it’s a bit peculiar that he didn’t break 48-seconds in the 100 fly, so that too may be where we see big improvements from him.

Distance Group Emerges: Despite the graduation of their leader Brent Hitchcock, an improving distance group gives the Buckeyes a very well-rounded squad for next season. Alex Miller was 22nd at NCAA’s in the 1650 last year. Unfortunately, he peaked mid-season at the home-team invite, but he did break 15 minutes for the first time in his career in December. As he moves up into the lead position in this group, sophomore Rowan Williams will fill in behind him. Williams scored points at the Big Ten Championships in both the 500 and 1650 frees, both of which ranked him 2nd among Big Ten freshman last season.

Ty Perkins, who will be a junior next year, is a part of the distance group too. He was actually a faster 1650 freestyler than Williams was last year, but wasn’t able to make NCAA’s (Williams got in as part of the 800 free relay).

It’s fun to stay at the YMCA: The Buckeyes didn’t dominate in-state recruiting this year like they did the fall before, but they did grab the big target and the state’s best in Josh Fleagle. As mentioned above, the Buckeyes have a great leadoff and anchor for their free relays, but they are badly in need of both depth and some youth to build toward the future. Fleagle gives them just that.

He comes in with bests of 20.07 in the 50 free and 43.41 in the 100. In fact, he’s got a 1:37.91 in the 200 that should put him on the Buckeyes’ All-American 800 free relay as well. The only two 18 & unders who were faster than him in the 100 free in the 2012 short course season are Andrew Kosic and David Nolan, both of whom have a year of college swimming under their belts. Fleagle sits about even with Georgia commit Matt Ellis as the top sprinters in this class nationwide.

Andrew Brower and DJ MacDonald add two more pieces to an increasingly-fast, and exceedingly-young, Ohio State breaststroke group. Bower has bests of 56.2 and 2:01.9 in the 100 and 200 breaststroke, while MacDonald has been a 55.8 in the 100 (and last week was a 1:02.8 in long course).

Last year, the Buckeyes had 5 swimmers who were 55-or-better in the 100 breaststroke: aside from Stevenson, that included Dak Stone, Sean Johnson, Jared Kauffman, and Chris Cowley. By class, that’s 4 freshman and 1 sophomore. With a constant battle to remain on the A-squad, the cream will have no choice but to rise to the top. I’d expect another swimmer to move up to Stevenson’s level next season, giving the Buckeyes a very good 1-2 punch.

Brower is very similar to the swimmers already on board – good in both the 100 and 200, not all that big (6-feet-even), and a pretty good IM’er to go with it. Another breaststroke recruit, David Morgan out of Florida, with a 56.4 in the 100 breast, is a slightly better 200 IM’er than Brower, but nowhere near as good in the 200 breaststroke as Brower is.

Chris DePietro is one of the most dominant swimmers on the YMCA circuit as an IM’er. He has bests of 1:51.66 and 3:54.64 in the 200 and 400 respectively, and is a great example of how well this Ohio State program has done at finding gems at the YMCA level. All four of the above, with the exception of Brower (from the Cincinnati Marlins) come from YMCA programs.

Diving: Ohio State has one of the country’s top diving programs, which is a must to compete in the Big Ten. They return a pair of All-American divers in Shane Miszkiel and Christian Holstein, who combined to score 13 NCAA points on the 3-meter last year. Miszkiel is also capable of scoring big on the platform, but didn’t have a great performance in that event at the Natinoal Championship meet.

The Zone becomes even more difficult to get out of this year. The number of allocated spots will likely drop by at least 1 after many of Purdue’s divers redshirted for Olympic preparation (the number of divers allocated out of each zone is determined by their performance from the previous year’s NCAA Championships). With the Boilermakers likely back to full-strength, and Indiana rolling with a lot of returning divers, Zone C will be cuthroat this season.

Overall Outlook for 2012-2013: With the return of Phillips and a big freshman class from last year entering their second season in Columbus, the Buckeyes’ depth should now be at a place where they can return to challenging Michigan for Big Ten titles. In order to move into a top-8 finish at NCAA’s, though, they need two things to happen: they need to peak better at the end of the year rather than at their mid-season invite, and they need someone aside from Phillips or Schurr to step up in an individual event.

That may be someone from the distance group; another swimmer to look at is sophomore Jacob Schuster, who has a 44.8 in the 100 free and a 1:36.1 in the 200. Stevenson in the breaststrokes is a good candidate as well for individual points

But the money for the Buckeyes will continue to be their relays, and they’ve got those in spades. With all of them looking strong for top-10 finishes at NCAA’s, and all a near-lock lock to at least score, anything less than 10th at NCAA’s would be a let-down.