IU Men’s Swimming & Diving Ready for NCAA Championships

Wednesday, March 23

Atlanta, GA

6:00 PM

Indiana University

NCAA Championships - Finals

IU Men’s Swimming & Diving Ready for NCAA Championships

3/22/2016 10:29:00 AM | Men's Swimming and Diving

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – The No. 8-ranked Indiana University men's swimming and diving team will head south to Atlanta for the 2016 NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships, hosted by Georgia Tech University.

The four-day meet gets underway on Wednesday night at the McAuley Aquatic Center with the finals of the 800 freestyle relay. The next three days will feature prelims beginning at 10 a.m. ET, with finals following at 6 p.m. ET. Diving trials and consolation finals will begin following swimming prelims Thursday through Saturday.

ESPN3.com will live stream finals sessions on Friday and Saturday. Wednesday's evening session, Thursday's sessions, along with the morning sessions on Friday and Saturday, will be streamed live on NCAA.com.

Hoosiers at the 2016 NCAA Championships
Indiana will send 11 student-athletes to the 2016 NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships in Atlanta on March 23-26. Along with the nine swimmers who qualified for the NCAA Championships, the Hoosiers also had both Joshua Arndt and Cody Coldren qualify as divers.

The Hoosiers have recorded some tremendous times this season, earning seven individual top-10 seeds at this year's NCAA Championships. In total, IU's nine swimming qualifiers was second-most in the Big Ten to Michigan's 11. IU will also swim in all five relays at the NCAA's – 200 free relay, 400 free relay, 800 free relay, 200 medley relay and the 400 medley relay.

Leading the way for Indiana will be Blake Pieroni, who is the No. 1 seed in the 200 freestyle and the No. 7 seed in the 100 freestyle. The Hoosiers showed their great depth in the NCAA seedings, as six different swimmers accounted for the team's seven top-10 seeds.

Below is the list of the Hoosier student-athletes at the 2016 NCAA Championships and the individual events in which they will participate.

Joshua Arndt – 1-meter dive, 3-meter dive
Cody Coldren – 1-meter dive
Bob Glover – 100 backstroke, 200 backstroke
Ian Finnerty – 200 IM, 100 breaststroke, 200 breaststroke
Max Irwin – 500 freestyle, 100 butterfly, 200 butterfly
Ali Khalafalla – 50 freestyle, 100 freestyle
Tanner Kurz – 100 breaststroke, 200 breaststroke
Vini Lanza – 200 IM, 100 butterfly, 200 butterfly
Blake Pieroni – 200 freestyle, 100 freestyle
Anze Tavcar – 50 freestyle, 200 freestyle, 100 freestyle
Cody Taylor – 100 breaststroke, 200 breaststroke
Sam Lorentz – Relays only
Jackson Miller – Relays only
Oliver Patrouch – Relays only

Indiana at the 2015 NCAA Championships
The Hoosiers placed 12^th at the 2015 NCAA Championships with a total of 126 points. The IU squad, with three freshmen, six sophomores a junior and three seniors, tallied 126 points, finished second among all Big Ten schools.

Last year, Indiana earned 14 All-America honors, including three from diver James Connor and two from Michael Hixon. As a freshman, Blake Pieroni placed fourth overall in the 200 freestyle Championship Final.

IU Places Second at Big Ten Championships
The Hoosiers finished second overall with 1,306 points, with Michigan winning the conference title with a total of 1,475.5. Indiana has finished in the top-3 at the Big Ten Championships for six-straight seasons and the second place finish is the fourth for the Hoosiers in the last six years.

Ian Finnerty was named Big Ten Rookie of the Year after winning gold in the 100 breaststroke and 400 freestyle relay for IU. Finnerty made the Championship Final in all three of his individual events in his first conference championships.

Joining Finnerty on the First-Team All-Big Ten Team was Bob Glover, Ali Khalafalla, Tanner Kurz, Vini Lanza, Blake Pieroni, Oliver Patrouch and Anze Tavcar. Max Irwin, Jackson Miller and Cody Taylor were named Second-Team All-Big Ten, while John Winck was Indiana's Sportsmanship Award honoree.

IU won six gold, seven silver and four bronze medals in total. IU's 17 medals were second only to Michigan's 23 this year and were eight more than Ohio State, who had the third-most with nine. Over the course of the conference championships, the Hoosiers racked up 14 school record swims, seven Boilermaker Aquatic Center records, 13 NCAA A cuts, 78 NCAA B cuts and 52 personal-best times.

Weekly Big Ten Honors
The Hoosiers' Blake Pieroni won Big Ten Swimmer of the Week three times this season, while Ali Khlafalla was also named Swimmer of the Week once this year. Joshua Arndt was named B1G Diver of the Week once, while Vini Lanza was named Freshman of the Week on February 3.

@IUSwimAndDive
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