Swim & Dive Primed for Trio of Top 25 Teams at Ohio State Quad

Saturday, January 20

Columbus, OH

12 p.m.

Rutgers University

Ohio State

Swim & Dive Primed for Trio of Top 25 Teams at Ohio State Quad

Jan 19 | Women's Swimming & Diving

Scarlet Knights look to make splash in the middle of Ohio State-Michigan rivalry

PISCATAWAY, N.J. (Jan. 19, 2018) – With the countdown to the 2018 Big Ten Championships at 26 days, Rutgers swimming and diving heads to Columbus, Ohio for a quad-meet featuring three teams ranked in the CSCAA Coaches Top 25 alongside No. 11 Ohio State, No. 2 Michigan and No. 24 Virginia Tech on Saturday, Jan. 20 at noon ET.

"It's the second to last meet before the Big Ten Championships," said head coach Jon Maccoll, "so we're using this as a tune-up for that. We're having our swimmers treat this as if it was the Big Ten."

The meet serves as an opportunity to preview the site for the upcoming Big Ten Championships (Feb. 14-17) and NCAA Championships (March 14-17), both of which are hosted by Ohio State inside the McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion.

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SWIM BITS

The Scarlet Knights are polled 49th in the CollegeSwimming.com dual meet rankings with 762.40 points. The rankings are generated by comparing teams across the NCAA in a dual meet setting. Rutgers is one of 10 teams from the Big Ten in the Top 50.
Rutgers' last competed in a home dual meet against Yale as the Scarlet Knights claimed six of the 11 individual events inside the Rutgers Aquatic Center.
Three Scarlet Knights accounted for those six victories behind two apiece from sophomore Francesca Bertotto, junior Vera Koprivova and senior diver Addison Walkowiak.
Bertotto claimed her fifth and sixth event victories of the season by touching in first in the 500- and 1,000-yard freestyle events against Yale.
Koprivova continues to stake her claim as one of the top backstrokers with her two wins over Yale, running her season total to seven event victories, tied for a team-high among swimmers.
Stoppa matches that total with seven event wins of her own in 2017-18, including five victories in the 200-yard butterfly.
NCAA B standard qualifiers this season include Koprivova (100- and 200-yard backstroke, 400-yard individual medley), Stoppa (100- and 200-yard butterfly), sophomore Federica Greco (100- and 200-yard butterfly, 200-yard individual medley), sophomore Clare Lawlor (50- and 100-yard freestyle) and senior Larissa Neilan (200-yard breaststroke).

DIVING IN

Walkowiak swept the 1- and 3-meter events against Yale on Friday, running her 3-meter win streak to four straight dating back to Nov. 3. She owns nine total event wins this season; four in 3-meter
Junior Rachel Byrne finished in second behind Walkowiak in both events in the Yale dual meet, helping co-head coach Frederick Woodruff's squad score 29 of the available 38 dual meet points in the diving well.
Junior Marin Bloise posted a career-high 272.85 points on the 3-meter against Yale, narrowly missing the 280 NCAA Zone Championships qualifying mark.

SCOUTING No. 11 OHIO STATE

Listed at 16^th in the CollegeSwimming.com dual rankings this week, the Buckeyes are coming off a convincing dual meet defeat of No. 23 Alabama on Thursday by a score of 180-118, and are 6-0 in duals this season.
Meg Bailey was named Big Ten Swimmer of the Week on Jan. 10 following wins in the 200-yard butterfly and the 400-yard individual medley in Kentucky.
Diver Camryn McPherson earned Big Ten Freshman of the Week after winning the 1-meter and 3-meter events in a tri-meet at Kentucky with Toledo.
The Buckeyes have a total of 16 swimmers that account for 26 top-eight spots in the Big Ten conference.

SCOUTING No. 2 MICHIGAN

The No. 2 ranked team in the land according to the CSCAA Coaches Poll, the Wolverines overcame No. 10 Indiana in a battle of Top 10 teams on Saturday, 180-120, to improve to 6-0 in dual meets in 2017-18.
Gabby DeLoof is the reigning Big Ten Swimmer of the Week after winning the 100-yard freestyle (49.17) and 200-yard freestyle (1:46.21) against Indiana.
Nikki Canale is the reigning Big Ten Freshman of the Week for the second time this season after setting career-high scores on both one-meter (284.95) and three-meter (332.70) against Indiana. She finished second in both events behind Jessica Parratto, a 2016 U.S. Olympian.
At the Big Ten level, the Wolverines rank 1-2-3 in the 100-yard freestyle (Siobhán Haughey, Gabby DeLoof, Catie DeLoof) and 1-2 in the 200-yard freestyle (Haughey, G. DeLoof). Additionally, Yirong Bi, G Ryan and Sierra Schmidt all rank in the top eight in both the 500- and 1,650-yard freestyles.

SCOUTING No. 24 VIRGINIA TECH

The Hokies are 5-2 on the season, picking up wins against Duke, Florida State, VMI, Queens and Liberty. Their only losses are to ACC foes North Carolina and Virginia.
Ranked No. 24 in the most recent CSCAA/TYR Top 25 poll, they will compete against Cincinnati and Xavier on Friday.
Virginia Tech is led by multi-event specialist Reka Gyorgy (leads the ACC in the 400-yard IM) and butterfly swimmers Maggie Gruber and Klaudia Nazieblo, each of whom rank in the top-10 of the ACC in both the 100- and 200-yard butterfly.

UP NEXT
The Scarlet Knights host Nebraska in the final dual meet of the season on Friday and Saturday, Jan. 26-27 inside the Rutgers Aquatic Center. Friday's session begins at 6 p.m., followed by a Saturday start of 10 a.m.

TRAINING IN THE SUNSHINE STATE
Rutgers swimming and diving rang in the New Year during a winter training trip in the Sunshine State from Dec. 28 to Jan. 8. The swimmers spent 11 days in Fort Myers, Florida, while the divers enjoyed an eight-day stay three hours Northeast in Orlando. Read more here.

HAIL TO THE CHIEFS
Rutgers Director of Intercollegiate Athletics Patrick Hobbs announced on Dec. 6 the promotions of Frederick Woodruff and Jon Maccoll each to the position of co-head coach of the Scarlet Knights' swimming and diving program. Woodruff, in his 25th year as head diving coach for Rutgers, had been named interim head swimming coach in November. Maccoll began his first season with the Scarlet Knights in October as the assistant swimming coach. Read more here.

RU RUNNER UP AT FRANK ELM
Rutgers claimed second place hardware at its own Frank Elm Invitational from Nov. 17-19 and honored junior Vera Koprivova as the Invitational MVP for scoring the most points over the three-day meet at Rutgers Aquatic Center. Koprivova claimed the MVP plaque with 107 points, just barely edging teammate and sophomore Federica Greco, who had 106 points, for the individual honor.

The Scarlet Knights compiled 1,447.5 points for the runner-up finish out of 14 teams, their best placing at their home invitational since 2015. Navy won the Frank Elm Invitational for the third consecutive year with 1,648 points, but Rutgers was closer than ever to the two-time defending ECAC champions.

SWIM & DIVE POSTS FIRST PERFECT GRADUATION SUCCESS RATE SCORE
The program achieved its first perfect score of 100 in the annual GSR report by NCAA Division I, released on Nov. 8. The score reflects an average for students who entered college from 2007-10. The graduation-rate data is based on a six-year cohort prescribed by the U.S. Department of Education. The NCAA developed the Division I GSR in response to college and university presidents who wanted graduation data that more accurately reflect the mobility among all college students today.

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