SAA Conference Championship Preview – Berry Vikings
2022 Predicted Finish – 2nd
2021 Finish – 2nd
2021 Score – 737
When the season started, I felt like Berry was a shoo-in for second place, and with some luck might challenge Birmingham Southern for the conference title (at least scare them a little). Unfortunately, luck for the Vikings has been anything but good. At the start of the season, Berry appeared deep enough that all 18 competing at conference were going to be capable of earning a minimum of 10 points. However,
Collin Dillard is academically ineligible, and worse –
Noah Brand, one of the top sprinters in conference and a medal threat in each of his events, appears to be out with a hip injury. Last year Noah earned 54 points alone, and he was a pivotal member of 4 relays. With those two out, the team will now be forced to field 2 swimmers that if they earn any points at all, it will be backend points and likely won’t exceed 3 or 4. This is so devastating to the overall team that I’m not totally confident picking Berry to hold on to second place.
Of the men that will be competing at conference, the best, and arguably the best in conference is
Ross Valdez. He will be competing for the conference’s best overall title, but he’ll also likely be going head to head with Daniel Snyder of Rhodes in both the 500 and the 1650. Two of the 3 best in conference going head-to-head in at least 2 events. Ross, should medal in all 3 of his races and he’s looking at posting a score in the 50s for the team.
After Ross, the next highest ranked Berry swimmers are
Ethan Whiting, Sam Tate, and
Bear. All 3 would be viewed as excellent and likely to be in several A finals. Here is another area where luck has worked against Berry. Both Ethan and Bear are distance specialist, meaning if they compete in the 500 and 1650 they will be going against Valdez and Snider mentioned above, along with BSC’s Fountain and Swing who’ve gone 1-2 in both those events the past 2 years. Meaning the distance events are exceptionally deep in this conference which will likely limit the return that Bear and Ethan will be able to provide. Tate is an extremely versatile swimmer and at this point I’m not sure what he’ll be competing in at conference. If I were me, I’d have him in the 100 back, 100 breast, and 200 IM, but there are other options for him including the 200 breast.
According to collegeswimming.com rankings, the remainder of the team consists of 7 that are good to very good,
Bartik, Blood, Kenny, McKinnon, McNeil, Rico, and
Smathers,1 just a notch below that
Richards, and 1 that I would call above average,
Horn. Then there are 2 that are average,
Stephenson and
Croker, but one of those two – Tyler Stephenson, has not performed up to his level this season. He’s a senior, and he’s been working on getting into different med schools, and I believe that effort has impacted his training. If he was able to focus over the last few weeks on his swimming, he could pop a couple of good breaststrokes like he did last year and move his score up into the good range. The last two swimmers are well below average and there is 1 diver, who will benefit from a small field in the 1 meter event and will likely earn around 8 points for finishing last.