Swim & Dive Big Ten Championships Preview

Wednesday, February 20

Bloomington, IN

6:30 PM

Rutgers University

Big Ten Championships - Day 1

Feb 18 | Women's Swimming & Diving

Championship Central Live Results Live Video Meet Notes

Scarlet Knights take on the best of the Big Ten in four-day meet in Indiana

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (Feb. 18, 2019) – Rutgers swimming and diving enters competition at the Big Ten Championships from Wednesday, Feb. 20 through Saturday, Feb. 23 at Indiana's Counsilman-Billingsley Aquatics Center in Bloomington.

The Scarlet Knights' regular season included two invitational titles, six dual meet victories, six NCAA B standard times, a new school record and multiple pool records at the Rutgers Aquatic Center and across the country. This success, while it does stand alone as a sign of Rutgers' overarching achievements during the 2018-19 season, is part of a larger goal the Scarlet Knights established at the start of the campaign.

"It's about finishing what we started," said head coach Jon Maccoll. "This team is closer than they've ever been, and they want to swim fast and score high for each other. There are indivudual goals we're going after, like earning the program's first Big Ten medal in a swimming event, but even those individuals will tell you those goals are part of representing Rutgers and putting together points for the team competition."

Rutgers finished ninth at both the 2017 and 2018 Big Ten Championships, its highest team finish since joining the league for the 2014-15 season. Last season, Addison Walkowiak earned Rutgers' first Big Ten All-Conference distinction with a runner-up finish in 1-meter diving, while the Scarlet Knights reset six program records at the conference meet in Columbus, Ohio.

Seniors Francesca Stoppa and Vera Koprivova, along with juniors Federica Greco and Francesca Bertotto all scored for the Scarlet Knights by making the finals at the 2018 Big Ten Championships.

FOLLOW LIVE
BTN Plus and the BTN2Go app will have live coverage of all the events starting Wednesday night and running through Saturday evening. Saturday's finals session will air on the Big Ten Network at 6:30 p.m.

Meet Central | Live Results | Live Stream | Tickets | Parking

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. 20	Thursday, Feb. 21	Friday, Feb. 22	Saturday, Feb. 23
200 medley relay	500 freestyle	100 butterfly	200 backstroke
800 freestyle relay	200 IM	400 IM	100 freestyle
	50 freestyle	200 freestyle	200 breaststroke
	1-meter diving	100 breaststroke	200 butterfly
	400 medley relay	100 backstroke	Platform diving
		3-meter diving	1,650 freestyle
		200 freestyle relay	400 freestyle relay

EVENTS TO WATCH

Senior 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 2nd fastest time in the event throughout the conference this winter, and also ranks seventh in the NCAA at 1:52.42.
Koprivova is also gunning for a finals invite in the 400-yard individual medley, where she is seeded 11th.
Rutgers looks to score big in the butterfly events with senior Francesca Stoppa and junior Federica Greco. Stoppa is seeded third in the 200 and ninth in the 100, while Greco comes in with the 10th best time in the 200 and 15th fastest in the 100. The teammates and Italian countrymates have combined for 15 individual event victories in butterfly races this season, led by Stoppa's 11.
Freshman Terka Grusova enters her first Big Ten Championships with the ninth seed in the 100-yard backstroke.
Junior Francesca Bertotto leads Rutgers in the distance events, ranking 18th in the 1,650-yard freestyle and 19th in the 500.
Junior Clare Lawlor is Rutgers' representative in the sprints with a 23rd seed in the 50-yard freestyle and 31st ranking in the 100.
Rutgers' 200-yard freestyle relay team is its highest ranked foursome heading into championship week. Stoppa, freshman Kasja Dymek, Greco and Lawlor are seeded ninth.
Off the boards, senior Rachel Byrne has scored points by making the finals in five diving events over her career. In her final appearance, she will look to improve on her best finishes - 13th on platform, 15th on 1-meter and 16th on 3-meter.

IMPROVING QUALIFYING CUTS
NCAA B standard qualifiers this season include Koprivova with three (100 & 200 Back, 400 IM), Stoppa and Greco each with two (100 & 200 Fly) and Grusova with one in the 100 Back.

UP NEXT
Four divers have already qualified for the NCAA Zone A Championships on March 11-13 in Annapolis, Maryland - Marin Bloise (3-meter), Lauren Boone (3-meter), Rachel Byrne (1- & 3-meter) and Jenna Douglass (1-meter).

SCARLET KNIGHTS IN THE OPEN WATER
Junior Francesca Bertotto placed 10th out of the 69 finishers in the 5,000-meter (3.1 mile) at the CSCAA Open Water Championships, stopping the clock at 1:03:27.23. Bertotto, Rutgers' 500-yard freestyle record holder, finished just 11 seconds off the national champion pace. Rutgers finished with a seventh place team finish.

BEYOND THE BANKS
The Rutgers Aquatic Center, along with the lanes and wells across the country, will be a breeding ground for Olympic and National Team dreams. Rutgers' roster is made up of swimmers and divers from the United States, Italy, Czech Republic, Canada, South Africa and New Zealand.

SWIMMING ABROAD
In mid-April, the Scarlet Knights will travel to Stockholm, Sweden to compete against international competition and close out their season at the Malmsten Swim Open Stockholm. In past years the competition has hosted numerous National, European and Olympic champions.

FOR THE B1G
Senior Francesca Stoppa and freshman Terka Grusova contributed to a decisive 251-102 victory for the B1G in the inaugural Big Ten/ACC Swimming & Diving Challenge at Purdue on Nov. 11. Stoppa accounted for three Big Ten points with her fastest swim of the year in the 200-yard butterfly, placing third in an NCAA B standard time of 1:57.19. Grusova posted her fastest time of the year in the 100-yard backstroke at 53.97 seconds, good for a seventh place finish in a race that had six NCAA B cut times. The Rutgers rookie was just three-hundredths of a second away from posting a cut of her own.

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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