Swimming

ASU Wins First Relay NCAA Title in Program History, Crushes 400 Medley NCAA Record in 2:57.32

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By Spencer Penland on SwimSwam

2024 MEN’S NCAA SWIMMING AND DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS

400 YARD MEDLEY RELAY — TIMED FINAL

  • NCAA Record: 2:58.32 — Florida (A. Chaney, D. Hillis, J. Liendo, M. McDuff), 2023
  • Meet Record: 2:58.32 — Florida (A. Chaney, D. Hillis, J. Liendo, M. McDuff), 2023
  • American Record: 3:01.51 — Cal (R. Murphy, C. Hoppe, M. Josa, M. Jensen), 2017
  • U.S. Open Record: 2:58.32 — Florida (A. Chaney, D. Hillis, J. Liendo, M. McDuff), 2023
  • Pool Record: 2:59.22 — Texas (J. Shebat, W. Licon, J. Schooling, J. Conger), 2017
  • 2023 Champion: 2:58.32 — Florida (A. Chaney, D. Hillis, J. Liendo, M. McDuff)

Top 8:

  1. Arizona State – 2:57.32 *NCAA, American, U.S. Open, & Pool Records*
  2. California – 2:58.30
  3. NC State – 2:59.71
  4. Indiana – 3:00.20
  5. Stanford & Tennessee – 3:01.97
  6. –
  7. Virginia Tech – 3:02.34
  8. Texas – 3:02.44

It took until day 3 of the meet, but Arizona State finally won their first NCAA relay title in program history, putting up a stunning performance in the 400 medley relay. The Sun Devils combined for a 2:57.32, taking exactly 1 second off the NCAA Record that Florida set at last year’s NCAAs.

Hubert Kos led off in 44.61, then Leon Marchand threw down a 48.73 breast split (more on that later), freshman Ilya Kharun went 43.44 on fly, and Jonny Kulow anchored in 40.54 to get the job done. Here is a split comparison between Arizona State tonight and Florida’s NCAA Record from last year:

Splits Arizona State – 2024 NCAA Championships Florida – 2023 NCAA Championships
Backstroke Hubert Kos (44.61) Adam Chaney (44.28)
Breaststroke Leon Marchand (48.73) Dillon Hillis (50.23)
Butterfly Ilya Kharun (43.44) Josh Liendo (42.91)
Freestyle Jonny Kulow (40.54) Macguire McDuff (40.90)
FINAL TIME 2:57.32 2:58.32

As the table above shows, the biggest difference between Arizona State’s relay tonight and Florida’s relay from last year was the breaststroke leg. Marchand was nothing short of exceptional. In fact, his 48.73 breast split tonight marks the fastest breaststroke split in history. That means we saw two of the fastest 100 breaststrokes in history tonight, as Marchand went the fastest relay split of all-time, while Cal’s Liam Bell cracked the NCAA Record in the 100 breast earlier in the session with a 49.53.

The crazy thing about Arizona State’s relay is that they could have been faster. Kos led the team off in 44.61, which is well off his season best of 43.75. Had Kos been near his best leading off the relay tonight, the Sun Devils would have gone under 2:57.

We should also point out that Kulow had a reaction time of -0.01 on the final exchange for ASU tonight. That’s a legal reaction time, but it’s notable because Kulow has been in risky territory with his starts all week. On the 200 medley relay on Wednesday night, Kulow had a -0.02 reaction time, and he was (positive) 0.06 on the 200 free relay last night.

SwimSwam: ASU Wins First Relay NCAA Title in Program History, Crushes 400 Medley NCAA Record in 2:57.32

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