…The Wisconsin Badgers are among the first teams in the country to release their 2012-2013 schedules, and there’s a bit of a shocking ommission – no Arizona Wildcats. While it may have been a fairly one-sided rivalry, the Badgers had made an annual fall pilgrimage to Tucson every year since at least the 2001-2002 season (the oldest schedule that I can find). That means over a decade of competition will end next season; the matchup went to a different place last season now that the former Wisconsin coach Eric Hansen is in Arizona, and former Arizona top assistant Whitney Hite leads Wisconsin. The Badgers will start their season very early this year (in September), and in the second week of October will run into a big meet with Wisconsin-Milwaukee. This will be a big test for the Badger men, who lost to the Panthers for the first time ever last season. The Badgers will also go to the mid-season Ohio State Invite, where they’ll see southeastern powers North Carolina and Florida. And Hite still isn’t backing down from the challenges of the Pac-12: in early November, he has the men scheduled to race Stanford and then both the men and the women facing off with the defending Champion Cal Bears…
…Also in that release, we confirmed that the Big Ten Men’s Championship next season will be held from February 27th-March 2nd in Bloomington, with the women’s meet the week before in Minneapolis…
…FINA sent out Olympic Universality invitations yesterday. Among those we’ve confirmed – Auburn freshman Megan Fonteno, representing American Samoa in the 100 free (57.35 seed time) alongside 26-year old Ching Maou Wei, who will swim the 50 free (27.64). Also, 2012 Big 12 100 breaststroke champion Amini Fonua will represent Tonga in that, his best event, with a 1:04.02 from last year’s World Championships. For a full rundown on what Universality qualifying is, see here. Time to get those tattoos…
…Another name has been added to the USA Swimming Banned for Life list, as Melody Sundbakken has received a permanent ban. The news isn’t quite as horrid as some of those who ended up on the list, but this isn’t a list reserved just for sexual offenders. Sundbakken received her punishment after embezzeling more than $10,000 from the Minot Swim Club in North Dakota. There are now 64 names on the list, only 5 of whom are women…
…According to the Brazilian site Sportv, the famed Brazilian club Minas Tenis has hired Scott Volkers as their head coach, and he led the team to the Brazilian Senior Winter National Championships last week (an event without most of the country’s stars) – his first title with the program. Among the biggest names on his team is Nicolas Oliveira, who will be on the Brazilian 400 free relay at the Olympics. He came to the team last November after an illustrious career in Australia (including as a National Team coach) that was marred by allegations of sexual misconduct in the early 2000’s. All charges were eventually dismissed, but he was left with no choice but to move on after the Australian government refused to issue him a “blue card” that would have allowed him to continue working with children in 2010…