Swim Like A Champion (a real life journal)

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by rjolley

First team All-SAA! Congrats Bear!

Breeze, how are Brett and Bailey doing? How have they been navigating the restrictions of the pandemic?

rjolley,

Hey, thanks for asking.

Bailey is going to University of South Carolina studying for a Cardiovascular Technologist degree, and is doing well and having fun. She actually got Covid about a month after arriving on campus, but sickness only lasted about 4 days, the bigger issue for her was fatigue, and that lasted much longer. Beyond that her biggest impacts have been restrictions at school that prevent gatherings, which makes it tough to interact and meet people. However, during rush her freshman year, the school broke the girls up into small groups to limit exposure and Bailey made 2 great friends from that experience. They get along so well they are planning to room together next year. She also got into a sorority and though there has been very little provided in the way of interaction she really likes her big sister. So at the end of the day, she's made some very good friends, which is what I was hoping would happen. Her swim "friends" growing up showed that they were far from loyal to Bailey, and I was really hoping that she'd meet a better group of girls at school.

Brett's had a harder time with the impact of the pandemic. Not sure if you recall, but he was coaching for Gold swimming when the pandemic hit. The initial flight to isolation caused the team to shut down, which caused Brett to be laid off. When the team ramped back up, Brett wasn't invited to return, as they were going to proceed with a skeleton crew. That ended up being a long drawn out story, where the owner didn't want Brett, then they wanted him but the owner wouldn't ask so he had another young coach do it which contradicted what the owner had said previously. This of course confused Brett as he felt the young coach was wanting him to return but hadn't cleared it with the owner, so when he didn't jump at the chance to return the owner sent a long nasty email criticizing him. At this point Brett washed his hands of that job.

From there he floundered for quite a while. Sleeping in really late, moping around, and generally acting bored and maybe a little depressed. He got a bit motivated and starting using my access to CBT Nuggets to work on IT training. In fact, he took the certification test for Network+ and was pretty close to passing with no practical experience. I urged him to look for an entry level IT job to get some experience before trying to take the test again, and he did. Eventually, he started working for a small IT group that does managed services for small clients, but also has a public facing retail shop for repairs. Brett currently works in the repair area, where he's fixing phones, computers, TVs, you name it, and he really enjoys it. He enjoys it so much that he is always working overtime, especially now when they are behind because he was absent for a couple of weeks due to Covid (he had almost no symptoms but the owner didn't want him around until he had two negative tests and that took a while). Over the last 3 weeks, and scheduled for the foreseeable future, Brett is working 6 days a week and logging around 55 hours. Having a more serious job has really helped, Brett now gets himself up for work, takes care of business, and is generally much happier.

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by thealmighty

Dola...


Any word on the seniors BSC will be losing?

Good question...I'll break down the impact of graduation soon. I'll need some time to compile that data.

[rjolley]

That's all great news, Breeze. Always great to see the kids start to find their way. I've been enjoying the same watching my daughters as they get closer to their college graduations.

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by thealmighty

Dola...

Any word on the seniors BSC will be losing?

SAA Conference Scoring Breakdown

	        BSC	Berry	Rhodes	Centre	Hendrix	Milsap	Suwanee*
Freshman	108	195	226	59	98	15	NA
Sopho	        213	 89	7	59	0	3	5
Juniors	        158	 37	144	265	74	0	60
Seniors	         79	156	54	73	18	4	NA

*Note: Suwanee only sent 2 swimmers to the 2021 championships as the rest of the team elected to forgo the meet to avoid the quarantine requirements upon return to campus. Numbers posted are from the 2020 meet.

- Berry's freshman class is good, but Rhodes was even better in 2021. (I will note that Berry's points are under-represented because of Ross Valdez's exposure to Covid just a few weeks before the meet. Had he been 100% he would have scored significantly higher than he did.)
- Berry's 37 point junior class is actually a bit misleading. Bo Dyer, who scored 39 points at the championship meet this year is actually athletically a Jr., but academically he's a senior and he walked with senior class so his points were added to the senior line in the table above.
- Things are currently pretty tight between the top teams over the last 2 years (Fresh/soph), despite Birmingham Southern's huge lead in the sophomore class

Obviously, Berry needs a huge recruiting class this year for 2 reasons. First, to offset the massive losses they are going to experience from the graduating class. Second to position themselves moving forward to be able to compete with BSC for the conference championship.

Currently, Berry appears to have a good recruiting class set up. I know there are a couple of A finalist level breaststrokers coming in. Along with a nice mid-distance swimmer. There are a couple of others who have indicated they are coming that will be nice additions, but they haven't been confirmed yet. However, as good as that is, there is a buzz around the team that the class could get much much better. I'm not going to get into specifics at this time, we'll wait to see what happens, but the current returning swimmers are all working hard to recruit friends to the school, and if they are successful this team will be in a prime position to challenge BSC for the title if not next year, in 2023. Fingers crossed...

[Breeze]

Berry Swim and Dive Teams Secure CSCAA Scholar All-America Award

The Vikings continue their streak, each earning honors every year since the program's inception in 2009. To earn the honor, teams were required to post a GPA of 3.0 or higher for the Fall semester.

More than 450 institutions were named to the CSCAA's Scholar All-America team for their grades in the Fall and in terms of NCAA Division III, Berry is one of 177 women's teams and 134 men's teams to be awarded the honor.

The women's team posted a 3.61 GPA, while the men's team earned a 3.47.

[Breeze]

General Update - Bear

Bear just informed us that he will be living in a 6 person townhouse next year, and the group he will be living with are all swimmers:

- Bear
- Ross
- Noah
- Paxton
- Riley
- Hunter

He's super excited about it. He wants to be able to cook some of his own meals and he loves being with his teammates.

[Breeze]

General Update

Through the years I've mentioned numerous swimmers the kids have gone up against that have accomplished a lot in the sport, and with the Olympic Trials coming up, I expect quite a few to be swimming there, so I could have several more updates to provide. However, this was one that I felt needed to be documented.

Jake Magahey, the distance swimmer from Georgia that dominated the 500/1000/1650 when Bear was growing up, just won the NCAA Championship in the 500 Free as a Freshman.

https://www.swimmingworldmagazine.co...in-five-years/

[Breeze]

Southern Athletic Association - Swimmer Rankings

Collegeswimming.com has a final ranking of the SAA swimmers for the 2020-21 season.

Season 2020-2021
Name	Team	Points
1	Charlie Fountain	Birmingham Southern College	720.15
2	Joseph Swing	        Birmingham Southern College	691.75
3	Dylan white	        Berry College	                691.60
4	Evan Ziolkowski	        Rhodes College	                684.95
5	Hayden Henderson	Birmingham Southern College	677.00
6	Ross Valdez	        Berry College	                675.10
7	Chase Bolding	        Birmingham Southern College	658.20
8	Arthur Bishop	        Rhodes College	                650.45
9	Chris Rubin	        Birmingham Southern College	645.65
10	Bear Breeze	        Berry College	                643.92
11	Carson Maggio	        Birmingham Southern College	636.70
12	Noah Brand	        Berry College	                636.38
13	Bryan Killian	        Centre College	                633.15
14	Anthony Carbone	        Sewanee                         632.10
15	Michael Bemis	        Berry College	                631.17
16	Harrison Rozman	        Rhodes College	                630.70
17	Maxwell Shoyat	        Centre College	                629.35
18	Henry Lang	        Centre College	                627.40
19	Alex Gauldin	        Birmingham Southern College	619.18
20	Driscoll Crabbe	        Birmingham Southern College	618.45
21	Jackson DeFore	        Birmingham Southern College	609.27
22	Garrison Herfel	        Centre College	                604.61
23	Will Guzman	        Rhodes College	                603.30
24	Paxton Higgerson	Hendrix College	                602.30
25	Hunter Kenny	        Berry College	                601.19

Berry also finished the season 12th in Division 3, but that is seriously misleading as several of the major D3 swim programs elected not to compete at all.



Note: The scores are calculated based on event swim times compared to the rest of college swimmers.

Note: Given the Covid options of this past season not counting towards eligibility, its difficult to determine what class each swimmer is in, the 2 italicized Berry swimmers I know are choosing to graduate and will not be returning in 2021-22

[rjolley]

Congrats Bear. Very strong freshman season.

[Breeze]

Academic Update

Bear continues to do well academically finishing the second semester with a 4.0. He came home for a short period of time, but is now back at school to be part of a research project. Despite the fact he's basically a freshman, and he hasn't had organic chemistry yet, he's been brought on to assist with testing and research of a long running study. The purpose of the study is to try and restore the American chestnut tree to it's former appearance. Apparently, if they can't determine what's impacting the tree's growth, then the American chestnut tree will cease to exist.

Basically, my understanding is he'll be testing the impact of fungus on the tree's cells. His group's part of the study is to try and understand why the Asian chestnut tree is resistant to fungi while the American version isn't.

I'll miss him during the testing period, but it's only for about 6 weeks and this was too good of an opportunity to pass up. It exposes him to the type of work he's considering doing and it looks much better on a resume than lifeguarding or teaching swim lessons for the 3rd straight year.

[Breeze]

General Update

Just some general notes on Bear's friends and training partners:

- Alex Gonzalez, who signed to swim with Iowa for the 2021 season only to enroll and almost immediately be informed Iowa was dropping their swim program, is transferring (along with 3 Iowa teammates) to Cincinnati for the 2022 season

- Despite having a pretty solid Freshman season, Tommy Eaton elected to transfer from FSU to Cincinnati where he'll join Alex and co.

- Two additional SwimAtlanta swimmers, that will graduate in 2022 - Owen Holland and Ben Grottle, verbally committed to Cincinnati as well

- Jack Aikens ended up being CollegeSwimmings #3 overall recruit in the nation. He's headed to UVA to compete.

- Grant Davis - #6 collegeswimming recruit in Georgia - committed to Auburn

- Nick Bohn - #11 collegeswimming recruit in Georgia - committed to Alabama

- Former distance swimming rival Brendan Hausdorf (#21 Ga.) committed to LSU

- Brett Sasser (#34 Ga.) committed to FAU

- SwimAtlanta teammate Sebastien Sergile is currently the #6 recruit in the Nation for 2022

- Roman Valdez (roommate Ross Valdez's cousin) is currently #4 in Georgia for 2022 and is verbally committed to LSU.

[Breeze]

General Update - Olympics

This year USA Swimming has elected to split the Olympic Trials into 2 separate meets. Wave 1, which features the lower seeded swimmers, and Wave 2, which will have all the contenders for one of the few team slots. I've looked into some of the swimmers that my kids grew up with to see who qualified for the trials. Here is the list:

Men

- Jack Dolan
- Jack Aikens
- Jake McGahee
- Grant Davis
- Liam Bell
- Ian Grumm
- Leyton Smith
- Raunak Khosla
- Bradley Dunham
- Jack Dubois
- Jack Dalmolin
- Aiden Stoffle
- Nate Stoffle
- Sebastien Sergile

Women

- Emma Cole
- Sheridan Schreiber
- Addie Rose Bullock
- Jade Foelske*
- Tristan Ulett
- Ryeene Ulett
- Abby McCulloh

*Note: will probably compete for the German Olympic Team

The Wave 1 meet starts on the 4th, and the psych sheet has been posted. I've looked through it, and there are several names of qualifiers above that aren't listed. I'm not sure if they elected to not compete, or if they will be in the Wave 2 meet because they have an event that reached the Wave 2 cut, thus they get to swim all their events in that meet (not sure specifics around competing in the two meets if you have cut times in both).

Here is who I did see in the psych sheet, along with their seed for this meet, if you want to watch out for them during the broadcast:

Men

Lleyton Smith - 100 Back (4), 200 Back (13)

Bradley Dunham - 100 Back (22), 200 Back (10)

Jack Dubois - 400 Free (19)

Aiden Stoffle - 100 Free (15), 100 Back (44), 100 Fly (15), 50 Free (76)

Nate Stoffle - 100 Back (27)

Sebastien Sergile - 200 Fly (19)


Women

Emma Cole - 100 Fly (17), 50 Free (10)

Sheridan Schreiber - 100 Breast (31), 200 Breast (14)

Abby McCulloh - 800 Free (3), 400 Free (12)


I'll add this same information once the psych sheet for Wave 2 drops.

[thealmighty]

Don't remember if this was asked or mentioned anytime in the last couple of years, but did Bear ever grow any taller?

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by thealmighty

Don't remember if this was asked or mentioned anytime in the last couple of years, but did Bear ever grow any taller?

Unfortunately, no - he's still 5' 8". We had hopes he'd be taller when he was younger, but he stopped growing pretty early.

[Breeze]

Quick Update - Olympic Trials

Was talking to Bear yesterday (6/6) and he mentioned a swimmer that I missed in the psych sheet. Henry Bethel made the 'B' Final of the 100 Breast. He swam with Ross Valdez's on the high school and club team.

[Breeze]

General Update - Olympics

The Wave 2 pre-scratch psych sheet was released. Here are the swimmers we've competed with and against that will be swimming along with their seeds.


Men

400 IM - Raunak Khosla (16), Ian Grum (34)
400 Free - Jake Magahey (7)
100 Brst - Liam Bell (19), Raunak Khosla (28)
200 Free - Jake Magahey (10)
100 Back - Jake Aikens (17), Jack Dolan (20), Nate Stoffle (32), Ian Grum (33)
100 Free - Jake Magahey (19), Jack Dolan (48), Jack Aikins (67)
200 Brst - Raunak Khosla (43)
800 Free - Jake Magahey (11), Grant Davis (38)
200 Back - Ian Grum (9), Jack Dolan (24), Jack Aikins (30)
200 IM - Raunak Khosla (21)
100 Fly - Raunak Khosla (58)
50 Free - Jack Dolan (57), Jack Aikins (59)


Women

100 Fly - Tristen Ulett (43), Rye Ulett (52), Addie Rose Bullock (61)
100 Back - Rye Ulett (15), Addie Rose Bullock (34), Tristen Ulett (42)
200 IM - Tristen Ulett (44), Rye Ulett (57)
200 Fly - Tristen Ulett (24)
100 Free - Tristen Ulett (69)
200 Back - Rye Ulett (9)
50 Free - Tristen Ulett (48)

There are definitely some swimmers here who could make B finals for sure and maybe even A finals, so if you are watching the trials next week you might keep some of these names in mind. I honestly wouldn't be surprised to see Jake Magahey make the team as at least a relay alternate in the 200 Free (needs to be top 6).

[Breeze]

General Update - Olympics

Just a quick note:

Jake Magahey made the semi-finals in the 200 Freestyle. So if you watch tonight you'll see him swim. Obviously, he did great to get to the semis, but he'll have to swim much faster to get in the top 6 and be considered for a relay spot.

Jack Aikens also will be swimming in the semi-finals tonight. He'll swim the 100 back, he comes into the evening seeded 11th.

And I missed a couple other swimmers in my search of the psych sheet. Addie Farrington swam in the 100 Breast today, and Micah Sumerall was a Gold Team coach for a while before Bear switched over to SwimAtlanta. Micah is also in the Semi's of the 100 Breast tonight.

[Breeze]

General Update - Olympics

- Ian Grum made semi's in the 200 back tonight

- Jack Aikins also made semis in the 200 back. He comes in seeded 3rd (though several of the big name cruised to a time good enough to make semi's and are behind him). He posted a 1:57.57 - which tied him for the 7th fastest 200 Back by a 17 year old in US history. He'll be swimming again tonight in the semi's, and while I don't expect him to really challenge for an Olympic spot, he might be able to sneak into the finals with another good swim.

- Ranauk Khosla made the semi finals in the 200 IM

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by Breeze

General Update - Olympics

- Jack Aikins also made semis in the 200 back. He comes in seeded 3rd (though several of the big name cruised to a time good enough to make semi's and are behind him). He posted a 1:57.57 - which tied him for the 7th fastest 200 Back by a 17 year old in US history. He'll be swimming again tonight in the semi's, and while I don't expect him to really challenge for an Olympic spot, he might be able to sneak into the finals with another good swim.

So Jack looked great in the semis last night and he made the finals tonight. He'll come into the finals seeded 5th, and if things hold true to form, Jack will likely lead the race early. In both prelims and semis he led for 150 meters, only to be passed in the last lap.

Edit to add: Jack finished 7th at finals

[Breeze]

General Update

Bear is now home for the rest of the summer and he'll be joining SwimAtlanta to train. He's not super excited about it, given he's really not in peak shape and everyone else already is. He's afraid he's going to drown...

[Breeze]

2021-22 Berry Viking Swim Schedule

 
9/25     - Home - Blue, White & Silver - inter-squad and alumni meet
10/9     - Home - Centre College
10/15-16 - Home - Viking Fall Fest Invite
10/23    - Home - SCAD
10/30    - Away - University of the Cumberlands
11/6     - Away - Emmanuel College
11/13    - Home - Sewanee
11/19-20 - Away - Point University Invite
12/2-4   - Away - SCAD Invitational 

12/28 - Winter training

1/14-15 - Home - Viking Classic Invite
1/22    - Away - Birmingham Southern
2/16-19 - Away - SAA Championships

* The initial schedule email had some odd dates included, which may mean they were recorded incorrectly, so the information above is subject to change.

[Breeze]

Bear moved back to school today. He's rooming in a town home with 5 other swimmers. Ross (roommate from last year), Hunter, Noah, Riley, and Paxton.

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by Breeze

Bear moved back to school today. He's rooming in a town home with 5 other swimmers. Ross (roommate from last year), Hunter, Noah, Riley, and Paxton.

Apparently, the first day Bear arrived on campus, every member of the swim team that was currently on campus (~20 guys) hung out in his town house, including all the freshman, who appear to be fitting in great. Also the team later in the day went to the pool to play a bastardized version of water polo.

[Breeze]

A couple of small things to report:

The team is in the middle of doing captain practices, no word really for Bear on how that's going so far. Interestingly, it appears that rather than splitting into the boys and girls teams for practices this season, they are going to split by A final swimmers and B final swimmers. Not sure how good of an idea this is. If your B finals swimmers don't have someone to try and keep up with in practice how are they going to improve significantly. Also, where do the Freshman fit in? They haven't had an opportunity to earn an A finals appearance yet, but there are quite a few that have times necessary to qualify. The suggestion was brought up by the Sr. women's captain and the coach agreed to it, but I believe the main reason for the request was so she and her boyfriend could practice at the same time. That will free up the ~2 hours of practice they would be apart when they attended separate sessions.

I also found out that team practices aren't schedule to start until 9/20. That's only 4 or 5 days before the scrimmage meet and only a couple of weeks before the teams first real meet on 10/9. Seems like a late start to me.

[Breeze]

Once again Bear's bad luck with awards continues. You may recall that his 800 Free Relay team took 1st at the conference championships. Well, when the medals were received, for some reason Berry never got the gold medals for that relay. Bear was bummed but he was still supposed to get a conference championship ring for that same race and he was more excited about that. Today, it was announced that due to budget issues caused by the pandemic the school won't be doing conference championship rings either.

It's amazing how many times Bear has been screwed by things like this...

[Breeze]

This new freshman boys class has been a bit wild early on. They've already had 3 alcohol related incidents and they've only been in class for about a month. The first was obnoxious behavior because he'd been drinking, the second was aggressive behavior because he'd been drinking, the third was a DUI. Not a great look this early in the semester.

The captains had called a meeting to discuss this with the new guys, but the coach ended up calling a team meeting. Bear was concerned about what impact this might have, but the initial meeting was pretty much just a discussion to tell the team to settle down.

[Breeze]

Berry College

This morning (9/20) at 5 A.M., the team had their first official practice of the season.

Edit to add - oh, by the way - Apparently the team opened the season with two-a-days. Not sure how long that will run, but it's a tough way to start.

[Breeze]

2021-22 Berry Viking Men’s Swimming Roster

With the season set to kick off this weekend with the team's annual Blue, White & Silver inter-squad and alumni meet, I figured I'd take a minute to update the team roster.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Alex Bartik (Jr.)
Alex continues to be a very good swimmer for the Vikings. In his two years on the team he's earned 24 points and 23 points, plus he was a regular contributor on the B relays. Last year he finished 9th in the 200 IM, 9th in the 100 Fly, and 12th in the 100 Free. It looks to me like he has the ability to score in 11 of the 13 events, with his best option being the 200 IM. If I were coach I'd be inclined to see if I could get his stamina up a bit to have him compete in the 400 IM, but my bet is he stays in the 200 IM, and the 100 Fly. Due to his versatility, the 3rd option could be just about anything, and will probably be influenced by the events other teammates swim.

Billy Blood (Fr.)
The first of the new freshman class. If you've been reading along for a while you might recognize this name. Billy is the swimmer that fell on Bear's leg during his senior year while playing Ultimate Frisbee and broke his foot. Bear worked hard to get Billy interested in coming to Berry, and Billy nicely fills a void on the team. Even last year with Dylan White winning both the 100 and 200 backstrokes and Bo Dyer making A finals, the team was very soft in that stroke. In fact, those two were the only Berry swimmers in the event, and now with both graduating, the team was potentially staring at a gaping hole in their lineup. Billy will fill part of that hole. He's not going to win the event like Dylan did, but he has the ability to make A finals in both the 100 and 200. His 3rd event will likely be the 200 Fly or 200 IM.

Noah Brand (Jr.)
The top returning point earner (54) from the conference championship meet, Brand is positioned to compete for the conference championship in every event he swims. Last year he finished 2nd in the 50 Free, 1st in the 100 Fly, and 2nd in the 200 Fly. Despite how good that is, it's very likely he won't swim the 200 fly this time around. I suspect, he'll focus more on his sprints and will end up doing the 100 Free instead. He will also be a primary swimmer on all 4 of the A relays he swims, and in fact, could take the primary sprint free role - or he might be the flyer in the medley relays.

Riley Coker (Sr.)
The senior captain, Riley is a nice leader, because he works hard and is very positive, but he's not a great swimmer. As I mentioned in the write up last year, he earns his points by working hard, and he's absolutely the type of guy you want on your side, because he sets a great example and he does whatever he can to help the team. He was a perfect selection for captain, as he's a glue guy that keeps the team together, and he acts as a mentor for a lot of the younger swimmers. Just like in the '19/'20 season he swam the 3 longest events possible, this time the 400 IM, 500 Free, and 1000 Free. As a sophomore he earned 17 points, last year he only managed to get 10. Part of the drop was due to the team fielding a deeper lineup for the 500, including Ross and Bear, which ultimately pushed Riley to 17th and out of the B finals. Riley did have some nice improvements last year though, including a personal best in the 1000 free (not totally surprising because it's probably the first time he's swum it tapered). I suspect he'll continue to swim the grinding events this year and with good training partners maybe he can continue to earn double digit points in conference.

Collin Dillard (Fr.)
The second member of the freshman class. Collin comes to Berry from Thomasville, Georgia, where he set numerous school records. However, he is a breaststroker/freestyler and those are the two deepest strokes on the Vikings' team. Which means he's got work to do just to beat his own teammates. His 100 breast time is a 1:01, which is very solid and would usually be good enough to make the back end of A finals, but with Berry's depth in that stroke, I suspect he'll be staring at a B final. He's never really swum the 200 breast, but the coach will probably train him so he will be ready to roll in that event, and I suspect he'll be good enough there to make the B finals as well. I don't see a natural 3rd event for him. He's not currently fast enough to score in the sprint frees, and he's never done the distance frees so I don't think he'll be able to race the 500 or 1650 effectively. There is one concern with Collin. He's apparently a pretty big partier and given that he's buried on the depth chart in his strokes, there's a possibility that he quits and transfers to a bigger "party" school, which would be a shame because, while he's not a rainmaker with points, he's solid depth and definitely a contributor.

Hunter Erb (Fr.)
Third member of the freshman class, and this one is also a breaststroker, only Hunter is similar to Mason Weaver from last year. To put him into perspective, his personal best in the 100 is 1:08. Because of the large freshman class added to the roster, if everyone stays on the team, and everyone stays eligible, Hunter will likely not be on the 18 man roster for the SAA Championships. To have any shot of making the 18 man roster, he will have to beat Mason Weaver (who is also not guaranteed to make the SAA team) in the 200 breast - which is where he might be able to pull a couple of backend points.

Abraham Figueroa (Fr.)
Originally the fourth member of the freshman class, but it appears that he's decided not to swim. Not a huge loss, as he would likely have not made the 18 man conference team either.

Kevin Fuentes-Bonilla (Jr.)
A diver only, that benefits from a lack of competitors in his event. Kevin was able to earn 12 points last year at the conference meet, and while he may finish last in diving, and he may only do the 1 Meter and not the 3 Meter, those 12 points will almost certainly be sufficient to keep him on the conference team. If he could add the 3 meter to his schedule, he could earn another 10 to 12 points just by showing up.

Andrew Horn (Fr.)
Andrew is the 5th freshman and 1st of 3 from North Gwinnett High School. Andrew is another breaststroker and he goes sub 60 (59.12) in the 100, which is typically good enough to place in the A final. His 200 Breast is also in A final range. His 3rd event will likely be the 200 IM, as his personal best would fall in the B finals. It's possible based on the schedule of events that the 200 IM and one of the breaststrokes might be on the same day. If that's the case, they might move him to a different 3rd event, but I believe the 200 IM is still his best chance to score on the 3rd event, even if he has to double up 1 day.

Hunter Kenny (So.)
Hunter is one of the 5 freshman from last year who earned at least 30 points for the team at conference. He managed to make 2 A finals, in the 50 and 100 frees, finishing 7th in both, and he was the top swimmer in the B final (9th) of the 200 free. He has a chance to make 3 A finals this year, and he'll be under serious consideration to be the primary freestyle swimmer on all sprint relays. I fully expect him to produce at least low to mid 30 points this season.

Ryan MacKinnon (So.)
The second of the freshman from last year who earned at least 30 points. Ryan was one of the primary breaststrokers last year. He competed to be the top breaststroker on the team and did well enough to finish 5th in the 100 breast and 4th in the 200 breast at conference. While his placing of 4th and 5th were really strong, his time in the 100 at conference was 59.66, which puts him middle of the pack on the team in this stroke for '21/'22. Interestingly, knowing the team was deep in the breast for this season, and recognizing the lack of backstrokers, he apparently focused on that during the offseason. Now what he ultimately swims will be a mystery, probably right up until conference. Even with the deep breast group, his 4th and 5th place finishes are hard to ignore, but another person scoring in backstroke would be helpful. His personal best in the back was good enough to make the top of the B final last year, so just a little improvement could easily push him into the A. His improved back will also help his IMs, and he did finish 11th in the 200 IM last year, and the 400 IM shouldn't be off the table either, in fact he could end up being a very strong 400 IMer.

Harrison McNeil (So.)
The 3rd of the 30+ point freshman from '20/'21. Harrison is very similar to Hunter, in fact, they often jockey for position with each other. McNeil finished 11th in the 50 free, but 6th in the 100 free, and 8th in the 200 free. He's another one that could step into Michael Bemis' role as the primary freestyler on all the relays. The interesting thing about Harrison is his potential. As fast as he is, he really hasn't had much in the way of training - his year round practices were only a few day a week, rather than 6 days and sometimes 2x a day, and because of this his form can get sloppy at times. If he can clean up his stroke, his times could really drop.

Breck Richards (Fr.)
The 6th member of the freshman class. Based on the times I've seen, he appears to be a sprint free/back swimmer. His sprint free's put him fractions of a second behind Hunter and Harrison - but also likely in the B final. His 100 back has a chance to slip in the A final. While his 200 Free and 200 Back are in scoring range, I expect he'll swim the 50/100 Free and 100 Back.

Emilio Rico (Fr.)
7th freshman and 2nd swimmer from North Gwinnett High School. Emilio like his former high school teammate Andrew above, is a breaststroker. However, Emilio is a more well rounded swimmer, and in fact, he'll have a chance to be the top freshman on the team. He's capable of making A finals in both breast events, both IMs, and both distance freestyles. I expect he'll swim the 2 breast events and the 400 IM, but that could be flipped. He could go both IMs and only 1 breast to free up spots in the standings on the breaststroke. However, I do expect him to swim the 200 breast no matter what. His personal best time is good enough to medal in that event.

Paxton Smathers (Jr.)
Paxton has been a B finalist point earner for the team in his 2 previous years. The interesting thing is how different his events have been between the 2 championships he's competed in. In his freshman year Paxton earned 6 points with 16th place finish in the 500 Free, 13th place finish in the 200 Free, and a 16th place finish in the 200 Back. Last year though, he earned 9 points swimming a totally different schedule. He finished 16th in the 50 Free, 11th in the 200 Free, and 15th in the 100 Free. I'm not sure what he'll swim this year, but my guess would be the sprint frees. I'm also not sure how many points to expect him to earn at conference. With Sewanee returning and with just Berry's team being deeper - those B finals spots will be harder to earn. However, another year of focusing on sprints might be all it takes for him to improve and get to the top of the B finals. Morever, he's very likely to be a regular on the B free relays.

Tyler Stephenson (Sr.)
Tyler returned to the team last year after missing the previous season and he competed with Ryan MacKinnon for the top breaststroke position. He'll be one of the pack of breaststrokers the team rolls out this year. Tyler's 100 breast time is 59.76 seconds, which puts him right in the middle of the pack, and his time was good enough to finish 4th at conference (gives you an idea of the depth Berry has in Breast with him being middle of the pack on the team and 4th in conference). His 200 breast time last year was 7th best. I expect he'll continue to do both those events, I'm not sure what his 3rd event will be, or even if he'll swim a 3rd event. His personal best times suggest he could potentially sneak backend points in the 50 or 200 Free, or the 200 or 400 IM. However, last year he never swam a 3rd event. Seems odd to not take the shot, but I'm guessing the lack of a 3rd event was Tyler's choice not the coach's.

Sam Tate (Fr.)
8th member of the freshman class, and probably the best of the group. Tate is the fastest of the group of breaststrokers with a 100 time of 58.38, and his personal best in the 100 back is also the fastest on the team at a 52 high. It's going to be hard to determine what Tate will swim as he has a chance to make A finals in both breasts, the 100 back, and both IMs. He's also right on the cusp of being an A finalist in the 100 fly. To emphasize how strong of an all around swimmer Tate is - his personal best in the 200 IM from last year's season - would have won the 200 IM at conference. It will be fascinating to see what he ultimately ends up swimming. It could be an odd line up like the 100 breast, 100 back and 200 IM.

Diego Torres (So.)
Diego, as I mentioned last year, really hasn't been a year round swimmer. So last year, as broken up as the training was due to Covid restrictions, it was the first "real" swim training he's ever received, and he improved a bunch. Enough that he backended a point in the 200 Free. However, with a much deeper team, even with another year of significant improvement, I expect Diego to be one of the swimmers not on the 18 man conference roster.

Ross Valdez (Jr.)
Ross was last year's freshman of the year - I know seems odd with him being a junior now, but he reclassified at the end of the year. Ross managed to take 44 points at conference last year, and he did it after just getting over Covid and out of the recovery protocol 3 days before the meet. It's a shame, because a fully healthy Ross likely competes for top freshman in the conference. How good is Ross? His personal best gives him a chance to compete for conference championships in the 200/500/1650 Free, 100/200 Fly, and 400 IM. I believe Ross is leaning towards swimming the 500 free, and the 2 flys, but we'll see where that ends up.

Mason Weaver (Jr.)
In the '19/'20 season Mason managed to backend 2 points and coming into last year I mentioned I didn't see any way he'd be able to duplicate that in '20/'21. Well I was wrong, he managed to bring home 3 points last year by finishing 14th in the 200 breast. Unfortunately, this year I don't expect Mason to be on the 18 man roster for conference. Like last year, I don't see anyway he's able to bring in any points - especially with the team adding 4 or 5 breaststrokers that are better than he is, that alone would push him out of any shot at a top 16 finish.

Ethan Whiting (Fr.)
Ethan is the 3rd swimmer from North Gwinnett added this year and the final freshman on the roster. He's also another extremely strong swimmer. Ethan is very similar to Bear, he's capable of reaching the A final in the 200/500/1650 Free, 200 Fly, 200/400 IM. His best event is the 1650 where he's capable of medaling. Unfortunately, with the 2 Birmingham Southern swimmers likely finishing 1/2 in the 1650, Ethan and Bear will likely be fighting for 3rd. I suspect, Bear and Ethan will both swim the distance Frees, and then 1 will swim the 200 Fly and 1 will swim the 400 IM (assuming the schedule breaks down so those 2 events are on different days from the distance frees).

Bear Breeze (So.)
Bear managed 42 points last year and a 3rd place finish in the 1000 (they shortened the 1650 last year because of the limited training period due to Covid). Bear will have his work cut out for him this year as the addition of Ethan is going to add a quality swimmer in the distance events on his own team, and at least 1 of the other teams in conference also added a good swimmer in those events. However, for the first time in years, Bear was able to approach his personal bests despite the less than ideal training during the season. If he can stay healthy, he could be looking at posting some personal best times, which would be exciting after so many years of struggling. As I mentioned above in Ethan's write up, I expect Bear to swim the 500/1650 and either the 200 fly or the 400 IM, with Ethan swimming the one Bear doesn't.

Chris Retana (Fr.)
The team finally updated the roster on the website and another swimmer I wasn't aware of was listed. Chris doesn't really move the needle, his strokes are not in guaranteed scoring range. His best option for scoring is probably in breaststroke, which means he'll be competing with Hunter Erb and Mason Weaver for a spot in the top 18, and of course all 3 could miss out.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Breeze]

Berry College - Projections for 2021/22

Berry had a great year in '20/'21 despite all the stoppages for Covid related issues. Unfortunately, Berry lost basically twice as many points to graduation as the next highest team in conference. The 156 points will be extremely tough to replace, and the impact Dylan White and Michael Bemis had on the A relays also can't be ignored or easily replaced. However, thanks to a big and talented recruiting class, Berry might just pull it off. Now, if everyone stays healthy and on the team, they will field a full 18 man roster - that's 1 more than participated last year, but the team should also be able to drop people that only earned a couple of points in favor of better swimmers.

In all, last year in the individual events, the men won 10 medals, had 15 other A finals swims, 4 top of the B heat swims, and 13 additional swims that score in the B heat. Based on trends and personal best times it looks to me like Berry should have around 9 medals this year, potentially 33 additional A finals swimmers, 9 swims at the top end of the B heat, and 20 additional swims that score. I expect the projections are slightly high, because I didn't take in account the impact the deeper team will have on scoring, as teammates will invariably push each other down the standings. However, even if you adjust the number down slightly, the totals still far outweigh the results from last year.

Unfortunately, I don't think they are quite good enough yet to overtake Birmingham Southern. Another good recruiting class this year, with minimal losses to graduation coming at the end of the season and Berry would be in a good position to win the championship in '22/'23

[Breeze]

Berry College - Blue vs. White Intrasquad Meet - 9/25

The season kicked off this weekend with the Intrasquad meet. Bear ended up on the Blue team with Ross, Noah, Sam, Hunter, and Breck, which seamed decidedly lopsided given Ross, Noah, Hunter and Bear are the top 4 returning swimmers according to CollegeSwimming.com and Sam is the best freshman.

Unfortunately, we don't have results posted anywhere and the meet wasn't streamed so I didn't get to watch it. What I understand is that the Blue team won almost every event, which isn't really that surprising. As for Bear, he swam the 200 and 500 Free and the 100 Back. Putting Bear in the back screams of the coach looking for someone to step into that role.

With practice just starting and the team doing 2 a days, everyone is extremely sore and tired so it was very unlikely anyone was going to post a good time. Moreover, Bear mentioned that he didn't get a real good warm up prior to the start of his first race. In Bear's first event he managed to win the 200 free, beating Enrico and Ethan among others. He swam around a 1:51 flat. However, following the race, he really struggled to get a good cool down swim in, and it showed moving forward. His backstroke was a poor 1:03 and his 500 was a 5:27. He was very unhappy with those results.

Some other items of interest. Ross won the 500 going away. Breck won the 100 Back and right now is the lead candidate for that role. Noah, went 49 in 100 fly and a 46 mid in the 100 free - he's definitely turning it up a notch.

[Breeze]

Centre College vs. Berry College - 10/9

The first regular season meet of the season is this weekend against Centre College. The Berry team ramped up extremely fast this season and most of the team is struggling with soreness and fatigue, so no idea how they will perform. With the strong freshman class I'd expect Berry to win the dual meet, not that the season record matters much.

Bear will be swimming the 200 and 500 Free and he'll be in one of the free relays. Hopefully, the treatment on his shoulder/rotator cuff is going well and he'll be able to have good swims.

I'm super excited to go watch this weekend. It's been well over a year since I attended a meet and it's been several years since I got to attend a college meet (which is much more fun than the year round or high school swims).

[Breeze]

Berry Swim Team Opens New Season Saturday Hosting Centre
From the school's website

The Berry men's and women's swim teams dive into the new season Saturday when the largest squad head coach Paul Flinchbaugh has ever had since he took over the program in 2008 hosts Southern Athletic Conference foe Centre starting at 11 a.m. at the Cage Natatorium.

"We've got a great bunch of kids," Flinchbaugh said about the 22 men and 22 women who will represent Berry this season in the water. ""We have a strong team on both sides and we're expecting a good opener with Centre. That will give us an idea of what we have."

The Vikings are coming off a strong showing last spring when the men placed second at the conference championships while the women picked up a fourth-place finish, with Flinchbaugh earning the SAA Men's Coach of the Year recognition.

This season, Berry will combine a blend of experience and first-year swimmers with the team bringing back six all-conference veterans on the men's team and five women who claimed All-SAA honors.

Returning for the men after a stellar season last year is junior Noah Brand, who was named to the DIII College Swimming and Diving Coaches of America (CSCAA) All-America team after posting an eighth-place finish at the national championships in the 100-butterfly.

Brand was also named to the All-SAA first-team and won gold at the conference championships in the event, setting a new school and conference record with a time of 48.8 seconds.

Also returning is senior captain Riley Croker and senior Tyler Stephenson, who was an all-conference swimmer last year; juniors Ross Valdez – the team's co-captain and an all-conference pick, Alex Bartik and Paxton Smathers; and sophomores Bear Breeze, Hunter Kenny, Ryan MacKinnon, Harrison McNeil and Diego Torres, with Breeze, Kenny and McNeil coming off all-conference performance last year.

Berry's women also boast swimmers who will be looking to repeat what they accomplished last season, including junior Viola Hasko, who won the 100 and 200 breaststroke at the SAA championships.

Joining her on the starting blocks once again will be senior captain Emma O'Heron and senior all-conference pick Taryn Shanahan; juniors co-captain Hannah Smith (co-captain and an all-conference performer), Grace Pleasant (all-conference), Emma Stewart, Julia Oliver; and sophomore all-conference performer Isabella Decker and sophomore Lexie Crosby.

Flinchbaugh said that he's looking forward to see how the newest group of Vikings who have joined the program will add to the team's strength.

"We had a great group come in," the coach said, "and I think they'll make an impact in the conference. Our goal is to increase the number (of swimmers) who make the national qualifier cuts."

[Breeze]

Berry Swimmers Open Year With Meet Split
From the school's website

The Berry swim team opened the new season hosting Southern Athletic Association foe Centre on Saturday at the Cage Natatorium, with the men's squad rolling to a 157-115 win while the women were edged by the Colonels, 142-138.

Leading the men was junior All-American Noah Brand, who touched the wall first in the 50 and 100 freestyle, won the 100 butterfly and swam a leg in Berry's win in the 200 medley relay with teammates Breck Richards, Emilio Rico and Hunter Kenny.

Sam Tate added a pair of wins for Berry winning the 100 breaststroke and the 200 individual medley, as did Ethan Whiting in the 1,000 and 500 free), while Ross Valdez won the 200 free.

Berry's women came out of the blocks with several wins as well, including the winning 200 medley relay foursome of Isabella Decker, Viola Hasko, Hannah Smith and Paris Thornburg.

Thornburg also won the 100 and 200 breaststroke, Decker added a win in the 200 backstroke and Sarah Fincher was a double winner claiming victories in the 500 and 1,000 free.

Berry remains in familiar water on Friday when they host the Viking Fall Fest starting at 5 p.m.

[Breeze]

Centre College vs Berry College - RESULTS

Centre - 115
Berry - 157

The men's team looked especially good over the weekend, despite the fact the coach had, IMO, several swimmers in the wrong events. To give you an idea of how good the team looked, last year in the dual meet up at Centre, Berry lost 111 - 161, this time they won 157 - 115 (and that's with their 200 Free relay being DQed). Had they not been DQed the score would have been 164 - 108.

Bear - is really struggling with his shoulder/lat injury he dealt with over the last couple of years of high school. I believe it was aggravated by ramping up too quickly. He's getting treatment from the trainers on a regular basis, and he's supposed to start some band work to isolate and strengthen the opposing shoulder muscles to try and balance out the joint. Hopefully, that works, it's awfully early to be dealing with this kind of thing.

200 Free - Bear improved on his time from the intra-squad meet posting a 1:49.97, an improvement of over a full second. He finished second to Ross in the heat, beating a very good Centre swimmer Henry Lang, and teammate Alex Bartik, who's very solid.

500 Free - In this event Bear improved dramatically over his swim in the scrimmage. He posted a 5:07.31, which was about a 20 second drop in time. Plus he admitted to backing off a bit at the end of the race when his place was assured. He finished second to teammate Ethan Whiting, who looks extremely strong early in the season. If Bear can't get his shoulder right, I don't expect him to be able to challenge Ethan at conference finals.

200 Free Relay - This was an extremely exciting relay...Ross led off and and at the start of the second leg, the race was dead even. Billy Blood took the second leg, and when he handed off to Bear it was still dead even. I was a bit concerned, because Bear is more of a distance swimmer, and I didn't want him to get beat bad in his split, but as it turns out it was the exact opposite. Bear opened a little more than a half body length lead, before he handed off to Hunter, who took that advantage and added to it. Unfortunately, the team was DQed, no reason was given in the results, but it was almost certainly someone leaving early. Bear admitted he was close to a DQ, as was Billy from my naked eye perspective from the stands. I'm disappointed that it happened, because if Bear did leave early it only helped him by about .3 seconds at the most, so he still would have provided a nice lead for the team in his leg, with a legal or even significantly more conservative start. Plus I was eager to see what his split was in the race, but with the dq, times aren't posted. As it turns out, the splits weren't posted anyway so I still wouldn't know.

[Breeze]

Viking Fall Fest Invite - CANCELED

The meet this weekend was canceled. We didn't get much information on why, but what we did get indicated that Covid and budget issues contributed to the cancelation. Reading between the lines, I'm assuming the teams invited elected to not attend the multi-day event so they could avoid paying for a hotel, due to a restricted budget caused by Covid.

[Breeze]

Blue vs. White v2? - 10/15 - 17

With the cancelation of the Viking Invite the coach has elected to run another intra-squad meet, but this time he's going to follow the times allocated for the invite. Meaning the kids will be swimming in 3 sessions over 2 days.

The sessions breakdown like this:

Friday Afternoon
200 Freestyle Relay
50 Butterfly
50 Backstroke
50 Breaststroke
50 Freestyle
1000 Freestyle
200 Medley Relay

Saturday Morning
400 Freestyle Relay
200 Butterfly
200 Backstroke
200 Breaststroke
200 Freestyle
200 Individual Medley
(30-minute Diving warmup)
One Meter Diving (11 Dives)

Saturday Afternoon
400 Medley Relay
500 Freestyle
100 Butterfly
100 Backstroke
100 Breaststroke
100 Freestyle
400 Individual Medley


Bear - originally he was going to swim the 50, 500, and 1000 Free, as well as the 200 Fly, but given his shoulder issues and that this is just an intra-squad meet he's elected to back off on his distances for a while, give the strength training exercises he was assigned in PT a chance to work, before ramping back up the yardage. Not sure yet what he'll race this weekend, but I expect it to all be 200s or less. I'm also not sure how much he'll be able to back off in practices, because the coach is planning to use Monday and Tuesday, the school's fall break to run two-a-day practices plus weight training each day.

[Breeze]

Blue vs. White v2? - RESULTS

The overall scores are irrelevant given this was a scrimmage and many swimmers chose to do some secondary events rather than swim their primary strokes.

Bear - had a nice meet, especially with the tender shoulder/lat and it being an early in season meet.

#4 50 Fly - Session 1 - Bear's first swim of the meet and he posted a 24.92. Once kids get to be 13, the 50 fly isn't really swum anymore so this was probably an event the coach used to get an idea of who should swim fly in the medley relay. Bear's time was good for 3rd, finishing behind Noah and Ross - so no shame in that. In fact, Bear was only .24 seconds behind Ross.

#10 50 Free - Session 1 - not long after the 50 Fly, Bear was racing again in the 50 Free. This time he finished 4th, behind Noah, Hunter and Harrison - all 3 A relay swimmers. He posted a 22.67, which was a PERSONAL BEST!!! This swim was also likely good enough to get him into some sprint free relays at conference. Probably the B, but that's still better than watching them all.

#14 200 Medley Relay - Session 1 - Bear swim the fly in the relay and he split a 24.48, which is a nice time and right in line with his 50 fly above. With that swim session 1 was over.

#16 400 Free Relay - Session 2 - Bear's split in the relay was a 49.46, which is only .2 seconds off a personal best which is really close under his current condition.

#24 200 Free - Session 2 - Bear won this event with a solid 1:50.63, about a second off of his swim the previous week. Bear told me that the entire field took this race out extremely slowly. He said it was pretty much a 1650 pace it was so slow. In fact, it was so slow he had trouble kicking it into gear later in the race. This is another good performance as it hopefully strengthens his position on the 800 Free relay.

#30 400 Medley Relay - Session 3 - Bear drew the fly leg again, and his split was a 53.02, his personal best is 53.33 - so obviously he swam it well. It doesn't count as a PB because he got the rolling relay start, but that typically improves your time around .3 to .5 - so he's right on it.

#40 100 Free - Session 3 - Bear's last event was another good swim. He clocked in at 49.61, again a fraction off of his personal best time. He also finished 3rd behind Noah (who broke the pool record with his time of 45.76), and Harrison. He managed to beat Breck and Hunter, which was big (but in Hunter's defense, he did swim the 500 free at the beginning of the session.

Bear says the exercises he's been given by the trainer is helping his shoulder, hopefully it continues to improve and he can build on this strong weekend performance.

[Breeze]

SCAD vs Berry College @ Cage Center - 10/23

Berry will take on SCAD this weekend, and they will also get killed. As improved as Berry is, SCAD has NAIA national championships and they've reached a point where they are competing for the championship every year. In fact, they currently have the top ranked NAIA swimmer in the country, Joel Thatcher. In a meet against Georgia Tech a couple of weeks ago, Joel was ranked the 7th best male swimmer of the meet. Better than 3/4s of the Tech team. Oh, did I mention he typically swims the 200, 500, 1650? Not sure he'll swim all those on Saturday, but that's his wheelhouse.

Here are the order of events:

1. Women/Men One Meter Diving
2. Women’s 200 Medley Relay
3. Men’s 200 Medley Relay
4. Women’s 1000 Freestyle
5. Men’s 1000 Freestyle
6. Women’s 200 Freestyle
7. Men’s 200 Freestyle
8. Women’s 100 Backstroke
9. Men’s 100 Backstroke
10. Women’s 100 Breaststroke
11. Men’s 100 Breaststroke
12. Women’s 200 Butterfly
13. Men’s 200 Butterfly
14. Women’s 50 Freestyle
15. Men’s 50 Freestyle
16. Women’s 100 Freestyle
17. Men’s 100 Freestyle
18. Women’s 200 Backstroke
19. Men’s 200 Backstroke
20. Women’s 200 Breaststroke
21. Men’s 200 Breaststroke
22. Women’s 500 Freestyle
23. Men’s 500 Freestyle
24. Women’s 100 Butterfly
25. Men’s 100 Butterfly
26. Women’s 200 IM
27. Men’s 200 IM
28. Women’s 400 Freestyle Relay
29. Men’s 400 Freestyle Relay

No idea yet, what Bear will be swimming.

[JAG]

Has the trainer given any idea when they expect Bear’s shoulder to be healed?

[Breeze]

Hey JAG, hope you're doing well.

Bear hasn't relayed any information regarding his treatment outlook, other than to tell us the exercises seem to be helping. My opinion is that the shoulder won't improve significantly until the season ends and he can take some time off (while still doing the exercises to strengthen the other muscles in the shoulder). At this point, I believe it's an exercise in managing the situation as best he can with treatment, exercise, and stretching.

We are going to watch him this Saturday, so I'll see if I can pull some details out of him.

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by Breeze

SCAD vs Berry College @ Cage Center - 10/23

Quick update. Bear is apparantly swimming the 200 fly, 500 free and a leg in the A 400 free relay.

[Breeze]

SCAD vs Berry College - RESULTS

SCAD - 128
Berry - 127

It turned out to be a close meet on Saturday, though probably not as close as the score would indicate. SCAD came in with a surprisingly small roster of just 11 guys. They were led by about 4 to 5 real strong swimmers (all of whom seemed to be 23 years old), but the remainder of the roster was mediocre, so Berry kept it tight with their depth. The margin of victory was impacted by SCADs DQ in the 400 Free Relay at the end of the meet. They won the relay but by getting DQed, Berry pulled to within 1 point. The stupid thing was they were DQed for not exiting the water fast enough during the race.

Bear - when I learned what he was going to be swimming I was concerned about how he'd hold up. A 200 Fly, 500 Free is a tough double, and his tender shoulder was going to make it even harder.

200 Fly - wanted to take it out controlled and build into the race, but fatigue hit early and he ended up swimming a pretty controlled 150, and a gut it out final 50. He finished in a time of 2:05.14 and finished 3rd, behind Ross and one of the good SCAD swimmers.

500 Free - This one he said really started to hurt his shoulder. He ended up swimming the race almost at the same pace as he did against Centre a few weeks back, posting a 5:06.98, but serious concern about the shoulder lingers.

400 Free Relay - Bear took the second leg on the A relay, and he wasn't really happy with his 51.25 second split. Given his schedule for this meet, I figured it was a pretty good swim. He did out-split Billy who swam the 3rd leg by about .2. In addition, the school fielded 3 relay teams and of the other 8 swimmers, only 1, Harrison McNeil - who swam on the A relay at conference, beat his time. In fact, the other 7 weren't even particularly close.

[Breeze]

Berry College vs. University of the Cumberlands @ Williamsburg, KY - 10/30

The first away meet of the season, and the team heads up to Williamsburg, Kentucky. The team will leave Friday, stay overnight, swim early Saturday morning (10 A.M.), and then head back home.

Cumberlands is another NAIA powerhouse program, consistently in the top 5 nationally. Unlike SCAD, this is a large team with 28 swimmers on the men's side, and 12 of those are international swimmers. This school takes swimming seriously. In their opening meet of the season a few weeks back, there were 9 swims that achieved the time standard to qualify to participate at the NAIA National Championships.

Looking at the times, there should be some really good swims, unfortunately many of those races won't be for first place, and I expect Cumberlands to win this meet. They are slightly faster and this time Berry doesn't have the advantage with depth.

[Breeze]

Berry College vs. University of the Cumberlands @ Williamsburg, KY - 10/30

Talked to Bear last night and he's swimming the 500 & 1000 Freestyle. I guess he's elected to gut out this shoulder pain for now. Not sure that's a wise idea, but he thinks he can handle it, and he's having a ton of fun with the team.

I also learned that Ross and he have elected to seriously increase their level of effort in the weight room. They've added several sets to their workout and it's kicking Bear's ass. He said he was so tired and tight at practice the other day, he could barely bend over to grab the blocks for a set with a dive start.

With the shoulder and soreness from the workouts, this could be a pretty ugly meet for Bear.

[Breeze]

Berry College vs. University of the Cumberlands - RESULTS

Berry - 82
Cumberlands - 189

This is pretty much what I expected. The Cumberlands top swimmers were faster than Berry's best so they won most of the events, and their depth prevented the Vikings from back ending points the way they did against SCAD. There were some good races for 2nd through 5th place in a lot of cases, but that's not going to be a recipe for a close meet.

There were some things about this meet that Bear found very irritating. To begin, the pool was only 6 lanes, which meant there were no lanes dedicated to warm up/down. Cumberlands did their warm up first, then when it was Berry's turn, they also had the divers warm up, which removed 2 lanes from the pool, crowding the 40 or so Berry swimmers into 4 lanes. On top of that, they cut the Berry warm up short at 40 minutes, because they needed to get back in to re-warm up. This inability to stay warm and loose was extremely frustrating.

Bear

1000 Free - Bear started out ok, but he said this swim became very painful for his shoulder (not a great sign for his chances at conference), but he managed to swim an 11:07.60. He said the lack of full warm up contributed to the pain and he thinks he'll be able to manage it moving forward as long as he is warm.

500 Free - In this one Bear continued to swim the same time he's been swimming all season, posting a 5:07.30. However, he was real pleased with the outcome, because he swam the same time he's been doing without his full warm up. He said his shoulder exercises helped with the pain he had from the 1000.

200 Free Relay - Bear once again swam on the A relay, and this time he led off, which means his 23.35 is a legitimate time. It's also one he wasn't really thrilled with, however, digging a little deeper into the splits, Bear's time was pretty good. Despite the fact he'd already logged 1500 yards racing, he still outswam Tyler Stephenson in his own relay with the cold start from the 1st leg vs. Tyler's rolling start with the second. He also outswam Ethan's rolling start leg in the B relay and was about .1 off Ryan's rolling start split from the B as well. The entire C relay was over a second slower, so all things considered it was a pretty decent result. I believe, he's doing well enough in these relays that he'll have a chance to swim some free relays at conference this year. Almost certainly the B relay, but that's still a step up from last year when he was only in the 800 free.

[Breeze]

Berry College - Recruiting Update

I'm pretty sure I mentioned earlier in this thread that with the strength of the last 2 recruiting classes, another strong one this year would give the team a decent shot to win the conference championship in 2023. Unfortunately, I got some bad news on that front from Bear last night.

It seems, Bear was talking with the new assistant coach (who handles the distance group practices mostly, so she's the coach Bear interacts with regularly), and she said that there have been at least 6 swimmers that would potentially medal at conference as a freshman that have filled out the recruiting questionnaire on the website. Sounds great, but Coach Paul isn't contacting them, and he refuses to allow the assistant coach to do it. He apparently says, "That's not the way we do things around here." I don't even know what that means. You have 6 high quality swimmers telling you they have interest in your team, and you can't even send and email out to say, "glad to hear it, come visit"?

This concept seems so foreign to me, and I'm guessing to you too. I mean with so many people on this site playing FOF, FM, and OOTP, a huge part of the fun is building a winner. Finding ways to bring in talent and improve the program. I don't understand how you can't do the minimum to at least reach out to the people who are indicating they have an interest. It's so frustrating to me, I had a hard time sleeping last night. I kept trying to figure out how I could do some recruiting anonymously through a generic email or social media account. Frankly, I really just want to let kids know if you're interested in swimming at Berry you need to do the following:

1. Email Coach directly to let him know you are interested

2. Schedule a visit to see the campus and try to coordinate it with the coach or at least do it at a time the coach will be present so you can meet him face to face

3. If you enjoy your visit and you'd like to get an offer to swim, let the coach know "I want to swim for Berry" at that point the coach will begin the process of getting your offer package together.

I feel like if kids understood the way it worked at Berry, they would follow the steps necessary to be on the team, but they don't know what he expects and he doesn't tell anyone so good swimmers just go somewhere else, or give up the sport.

I will say that the Berry men are extremely tight. They are constantly doing stuff together, and maybe the chemistry aspect of the team is what Coach Paul is protecting? Which is why he only wants swimmers that really want to be at Berry, rather than ones he convinces to come, and thus he makes sure they have enough interest to make the contact, follow through, and state they'd like to swim on the team before he does anything? Or maybe he's just lazy?

To my knowledge the team has 1 swimmer committed for next year, and he's another one that Bear helped bring on board. He's a nice fit and will help the team, but they need about 5 more strong swimmers to really challenge Birmingham Southern for the top spot.

[Breeze]

Berry College vs Emmanuel College @ Franklin Springs, GA - 11/5

Emmanuel College is a D2 school. A few years ago their team was at a point that Brett visited because it was a place he could have been competitive. That's no longer the case. In fact, last year Emmanuel was a top 10 D2 program. Early this year they are currently rank 25th. This is another team that is large (over 30 swimmers on the men's side) and that has brought in a bunch of foreign talent (15 international swimmers) to bolster the roster. In fact, they have a breaststroker that swam a 52.4 second 100 last year. To put that into perspective - that was the 30th fastest breast swum in all of college, not just D2.

I expect this meet to go slightly worse than the one against Cumberlands. I ran a simulation meet between Cumberlands and Emmanuel and Emmanuel won by about 25 points. With that in mind, we'll focus on our swimmers times and hope for some marginal improvement for the in season swims.

At this point, I don't know what Bear will be swimming. I'm also highly disappointed that we will not be able to go watch him compete. Emmanuel isn't allowing outside visitors to attend sporting events, so we are hopeful that meet will be available through streaming.

[JonInMiddleGA]

That recruiting situation is ... bizarre. And that's putting it mildly.

[Breeze]

Originally Posted by Breeze

Berry College vs Emmanuel College @ Franklin Springs, GA - 11/5

Quick follow up. Finally heard from Bear, he'll be swimming the 500 and the 1000 Free. And no, I don't get it either. I expected the 1000 would be off limits for a while, but who knows - I can't figure this coach out.

[Breeze]

Berry College vs Emmanuel College - RESULTS

Berry - 91
Emmanuel - 170

This was the absolute worst meet I've ever tried to watch on streaming. They set up the camera at about 3 feet above the pool deck in the far corner of the pool, creating a low angle view from above and longs side view which made recognizing anyone and determining how they were swimming or who was leading next to impossible. In addition, because it was set on the pool deck and was only 3 feet up, our view was consistently blocked by swimmers who stool poolside to watch and cheer on their teammates. To make matters worse, they never bothered to show the scoreboard so you could see the official times, and they didn't utilize Meet Mobile for the same purpose, so we had to wait until around 7 P.M. when the coach emailed us the results to fully determine how the team did.

As for as the scoring, it went almost exactly how I expected it would. You can see from the totals, it's very close to the Cumberland meet and it played out in a similar manner.

Bear

1000 Free - the exercises and a full warm up must be helping because he improved dramatically over his previous 1000 swim. He finished in 10:37.41. That's a season's best and an improvement of 30 seconds over last week.

500 Free - improved here as well, but not as dramatically. Of course he had to do this one about a hour after his previous distance swim - so fatigue was clearly a factor. He finished this on in 5:04.42, another season best, but only a couple second improvement over his previous best and 3 seconds over his swim last week. Still a good sign - especially if he can keep the shoulder from flaring up.

200 Free Relay - Bear led off the relay again, and posted a 23.27, extremely similar to his opening leg last week. Again he's not thrilled with it, but given this come up pretty quickly after the 500 and also after 1500 yards of racing, I think it's a pretty good effort. Again, like last week his split time beat most all the other relay swimmers. He beat Paxton's second leg even with his rolling start, he also straight up beat 7 of the 8 other relay swimmers, only losing out to Ryan's 22.94 with a rolling start from the anchor leg on the B relay. I'd love to see what he might post if he were more rested when this rolled around. Maybe I'll get a chance to see that at conference.