As if there’s not enough excitement in the world of swimming right now, the NCAA just gave us one more thing to get hyped up about. Last night the NCAA published its list of qualifying times for the 2017 NCAA Championships, which will be held in Indianapolis at the legendary IUPUI Natatorium. The women’s meet will take place March 16th-18th, and the men’s March 23rd-25th.
To automatically qualify for the NCAA Championships, a swimmer must attain the “A” standard in any event. All swimmers with “A” standards get invited, no questions. Relays, however, must not only have attained the cut, but also have at least one swimmer (or diver) that has been invited to the meet individually. “B” standards are in place to bring additional swimmers and teams to the competition and to give swimmers with “A” standards bonus events. All in all, a total of 235 individual male swimmers and 281 individual female swimmers are invited to the NCAA Championships.
For 2017, no event on either the men’s or women’s side, including relays, got slower. All individual “B” standards remained the same for both men and women. For the men, every “A” standard got faster, whereas most of the women’s “A” standards got faster, though some remained the same as 2016.
For those who need a more in-depth refresher on how the qualifying system for the NCAA Championships works, click here.
How Much Faster Are 2017 Standards Than 2016 Standards?
| Men’s A | Men’s B | Events (Yards) | Women’s A | Women’s B |
| -0.09 | 0 | 50 Free | -0.06 | 0 |
| -0.08 | 0 | 100 Free | -0.07 | 0 |
| -0.37 | 0 | 200 Free | -0.19 | 0 |
| -0.38 | 0 | 500 Free | 0 | 0 |
| -1.61 | 0 | 1650 Free | 0 | 0 |
| -0.07 | 0 | 100 Back | -0.06 | 0 |
| -0.46 | 0 | 200 Back | 0 | 0 |
| -0.15 | 0 | 100 Brest | 0 | 0 |
| -0.08 | 0 | 200 Brest | -0.09 | 0 |
| -0.12 | 0 | 100 Fly | -0.07 | 0 |
| -0.57 | 0 | 200 Fly | -0.21 | 0 |
| -0.36 | 0 | 200 IM | 0 | 0 |
| -0.39 | 0 | 400 IM | -0.01 | 0 |
| Qualifying | Provisional | Qualifying | Provisional | |
| -0.08 | -0.03 | 200 Free Relay | -0.18 | -0.15 |
| -0.37 | -0.52 | 400 Free Relay | -0.37 | -0.48 |
| -0.87 | -0.56 | 800 Free Relay | -1.09 | -1.03 |
| -0.25 | -0.27 | 200 Medley Relay | -0.25 | -0.25 |
| -0.58 | -0.48 | 400 Medley Relay | -0.49 | -0.35 |
2017 NCAA Division I Qualifying Standards
| Men | Women | |||
| A Standard | B Standard | YARDS | A Standard | B Standard |
| 19.09 | 20.19 | 50 free | 21.80 | 22.99 |
| 42.25 | 44.29 | 100 free | 47.69 | 49.99 |
| 1:32.97 | 1:37.99 | 200 free | 1:43.63 | 1:47.99 |
| 4:13.22 | 4:24.99 | 500 free | 4:36.30 | 4:47.79 |
| 14:44.43 | 15:30.39 | 1650 free | 15:53.50 | 16:30.59 |
| 45.73 | 48.29 | 100 fly | 51.49 | 54.49 |
| 1:41.86 | 1:47.99 | 200 fly | 1:54.01 | 1:59.59 |
| 45.37 | 48.49 | 100 back | 51.45 | 55.09 |
| 1:39.87 | 1:46.39 | 200 back | 1:51.95 | 1:59.19 |
| 51.93 | 55.39 | 100 breast | 59.04 | 1:01.49 |
| 1:52.99 | 1:59.79 | 200 breast | 2:07.33 | 2:15.99 |
| 1:42.15 | 1:49.09 | 200 IM | 1:55.35 | 2:01.59 |
| 3:40.76 | 3:54.49 | 400 IM | 4:05.36 | 4:19.39 |
| Qualifying | Provisional | Qualifying | Provisional | |
| 1:17.77 | 1:18.46 | 200 free relay | 1:28.98 | 1:29.75 |
| 2:52.45 | 2:53.68 | 400 free relay | 3:15.78 | 3:17.11 |
| 6:20.67 | 6:24.50 | 800 free relay | 7:05.68 | 7:08.93 |
| 1:25.05 | 1:25.86 | 200 medley relay | 1:37.21 | 1:37.71 |
| 3:07.75 | 3:09.68 | 400 medley relay | 3:33.40 | 3:34.96 |
Some of these are ridiculous and there will be like 3 people getting A times lol
Welcome to division one swimming. The world’s fastest swim league. Actually they roughly 1/2 between A and B cut. They do not want alot of A qualifiers.
Not even half…..
Looking at 2015-2016
On the men’s side the most A cuts out of the 100’s was 14 in the men’s 100 Fly.
On the men’s side the most A cuts out of the 200’s was 15 in the men’s 200 Fly.
On the women’s side the most A cuts out of the 100’s was 16 in the women’s 100 Back .
On the women’s side the most A cuts out of the 200’s was 13 in the women’s 200 Back .
And those are the events with the MOST. They often have 3 or 4 more swimmers than the next closest event.
In majority of events the number of people with… Read more »
Great point about the NCAA controlling numbers and accordingly cost. It might be best to only allow Texas, Cal and 2 other teams on the Men’s side and Stanford, UGA and 6 other teams on the Wonen’s side into the meet. The NCAA would save a ton of money. Get rid of diving!!!
19.09 50 free that’s wicked fast only 8 people would have made that last year and 3 of them are gone