Swim & Dive Set for B1G Championships

Wednesday, February 14

Columbus, Ohio

6:30 p.m.

Rutgers University

Big Ten Championships

Feb 13 | Women's Swimming & Diving

Championship Central

Scarlet Knights seeking records, cut times and team improvement at four-day meet in Columbus

COLUMBUS, Ohio. (Feb. 13, 2018) – Rutgers swimming and diving enters competition at the Big Ten Championships from Wednesday, Feb. 14 through Saturday, Feb. 17 at Ohio State's McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion in Columbus.

Eleven NCAA B standards, six dual meet wins, one new program record and countless personal best swims have all led to one of the biggest meets of the season against some of the top programs in the country. The Scarlet Knights have made their ambitions clear from Day 1 of the preseason, all the way to warm ups in Columbus, Ohio this week.

"Everyone is going to work hard and swim for each other," said head coach Jon Maccoll. "The team culture has been this program's strong suit all season. They compete for the name on the front of the shirt. We're poised to swim fast and challenge some records on that board in the Rutgers Aquatic Center. They put in the work, all they have to do is execute."

Rutgers finished ninth at the 2017 Big Ten Championships, its highest team finish since joining the league for the 2014-15 season. "We've moved up one spot each year since joining the Big Ten," Maccoll said. "We want to continue that climb."

FOLLOW LIVE
BTN Plus will have live coverage of all the events starting Wednesday night and running through Saturday evening. A tape delay of Saturday's finals session will air on the Big Ten Network at 11 a.m. ET Sunday morning.

Meet Central | Live Results | Live Stream | Tickets

THE CHAMPIONSHIPS
Seven sessions will be contested throughout the week. The first session begins at 6:30 p.m. ET on Wednesday with the 200 medley and 800 freestyle relays. The schedule for Thursday, Friday and Saturday will feature a prelims session each morning at 11 a.m. ET, and the qualifying athletes will return for the finals session each evening at 6:30 p.m. ET. On the diving boards, the one-meter will be contested on Thursday, the three-meter on Friday and platform diving will be on Saturday. Diving will begin each day at 1:30 p.m. ET.

Wednesday, Feb. 14	Thursday, Feb. 15	Friday, Feb. 16	Saturday, Feb. 17
200 medley relay	500 freestyle	100 butterfly	200 backstroke
800 freestyle relay	200 IM	400 IM	100 freestyle
	50 freestyle	200 freestyle	200 breaststroke
	One-meter diving	100 breaststroke	200 butterfly
	400 medley relay	100 backstroke	Platform diving
		Three-meter diving	1,650 freestyle
		200 freestyle relay	400 freestyle relay

EVENTS TO WATCH

Off the boards, senior Addison Walkowiak will look to improve on her sixth place finishes on both 1- and 3-meter events from last year's Big Ten Championships. She currently owns the top 3-meter score in the Big Ten this season at 359.60, while ranking second on 1-meter and eighth in platform.
Rutgers looks to score big in the butterfly events with junior Francesca Stoppa and sophomore Federica Greco. Stoppa is seeded sixth in the 200 and eighth in the 100, while Greco comes in with the 16^th best time in the 200 and 17^th fastest in the 100. A good in-house competition is brewing between the teammates as Greco defeated Stoppa in both events last meet, which will push both to higher finishes at the Big Ten Championships.
Junior Vera Koprivova will be seeking a return to the championship final of the 200-yard backstroke, where she finished fifth in 2017. Koprivova owns the 10^th fastest time in the event throughout the conference this winter.
Koprivova is also gunning for a finals invite in the 400-yard individual medley, where she is seeded 19^th.
Sophomore Francesca Bertotto leads Rutgers in the distance events, ranking 11^th in the 1,650-yard freestyle and 20^th in the 500. Freshman Sveva Schiazzano joined the team for the second semester and will enter the mix for a top spot in the conference.
Sophomore Clare Lawlor is Rutgers' representative in the sprints with a 19^th seed in the 100-yard freestyle and 20^th ranking in the 200.
Rutgers' 400-yard relays (freestyle and medley) are seeded ninth ahead of championship week.

IMPROVING QUALIFYING CUTS
NCAA B standard qualifiers this season include Koprivova (100- and 200-yard backstroke, 400-yard individual medley), Stoppa (100- and 200-yard butterfly), Greco (100- and 200-yard butterfly, 200-yard individual medley), Lawlor (50- and 100-yard freestyle) and senior Larissa Neilan (200-yard breaststroke).

UP NEXT
Rutgers hosts the ECAC Championships on Friday-Sunday, Feb. 23-25.

WELCOME TO THE FAMILY
Rutgers swimming and diving has added an 18-time NCAA All-American and three-time NCAA Division II National Champion to the coaching staff with the hire of Katia Alyabyev, a member of three NCAA Division II national championship teams while at Drury University in Springfield, Missouri. There she was an 18-time NCAA All-American and three-time national record holder. She also qualified for both the United States and Russia Olympic Trials in 2012, and swam her way to the Russian Olympic Trials finals in 2008.

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.

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.

Follow Rutgers Athletics on Facebook (www.facebook.com/RutgersAthletics) and Twitter (@RUAthletics) for all of the latest news and updates. For specific updates regarding Rutgers swimming & diving, follow the program on Twitter (@RUSwimDive) and on Instagram (ruswimdive). The team is also on Facebook (facebook.com/RUSwimDive).

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