Awkward Conference Scenario for NCAA Swimming is Best-Case Scenario
Surely, there must be some better way than the awkward destinations for conference championship swimming the past two seasons. Last week, the swim teams from Cal and Stanford traveled across the country to Atlanta for to compete against their rivals from the no-longer-aptly-named Atlantic Coast Conference. At the same time, the USC and UCLA women made the trip to Minneapolis for the Big Ten Women’s Championships, and the Trojan men also ventured to the Midwest this week, their meet in Madison, Wisc.
The culture clash has been particularly pronounced in the ACC meet. Traditional ACC contestant Virginia won the women’s meet, and the Cavaliers celebrated with their traditional splash into the diving well. That has been the routine every year when Virginia has won the ACC, under Todd DeSorbo as well as former head coaches Augie Busch and Mark Bernardino.
On the men’s side, however, the Cal Golden Bears won the conference but abstained from the celebration, just as they did after winning the conference meet last year and previously when they competed in the old Pac-12. That’s not a better approach or a worse one, just a different approach. The Stanford women, another team that has usually opted against conference title celebrations, actually tried to send its top swimmers home early from the 2025 ACC meet before the conference pushed back.
Ilya Kharun dominated for Arizona State at the Big 12 Championships — Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
In the capper for this year’s major conference meets, Arizona State swept the Big 12 Championships while rival Arizona finished second in both competitions. On several occasions at the Big 12 meet, Sun Devils and Wildcats comprised the entire championship final. These two schools, separated by just over 100 miles, have competed against each other multiple times annually. Naturally, the latest chapter took place in… Greensboro, N.C.
From a swimming perspective, the only power-conference team that has moved to a better conference situation is Texas. After a decade (more for the men) of essentially sleepwalking through the old Big 12 meet, Texas now has actual conference competition in February since moving to the SEC. Since the move, Texas has reignited its rivalry against Texas A&M across all sports, and most other teams are geographically not too far off. In swimming, the Longhorns have thrived, sweeping the conference in 2025 and 2026. The men won the 2025 national title while the women came in third, and a repeat performance (or better for the women) is expected this year.
Hardly the experience for the teams who have transitioned from the Pac-12 to their new leagues based in the eastern portion or middle of the country. Further swim teams throughout Division I are experiencing the same, as forces outside of their control of necessitated the switch from a conference meet against familiar rivals to a new one.
If only there could be something better for the west-coast teams, a February meet closer to home against traditional rivals that would be less disruptive to their preparations for the NCAA Championships. Why not bring back a meet just for those schools? It could take place in Federal Way, Wash., as usual, and the swimmers would benefit in almost every aspect.
Alas, no; it cannot happen. Think of the scene in Avengers: Infinity War when Doctor Strange utters, “There was no other way,” before disappearing from existence for the next five years. A massive sacrifice, but one the character deems essential for the Avengers’ eventual victory in the sequel.
For swimming, the current system is incredibly flawed but truly the only way. Conference affiliations matter a great deal to university administrations and athletic departments, and schools cannot maintain good standing with their leagues if they decide to opt out of championship competition in certain sports (or perhaps most sports).
Without conference support, swimming and other non-revenue Olympic sports cannot survive. Universities regularly look for excuses to eliminate programs, with high-cost, low-income sports like swimming regularly on the chopping block. What better reason than a conference deciding not to sponsor the sport anymore?
During the period when the Big 12 included only three men’s swimming and diving teams, Texas, TCU and West Virginia, a stakeholder suggested that the Big 12 could simply drop the sport, allowing its teams to participate in other conference-title meets. The well-funded Longhorns would have found a home, of course, but that decision might have been the death knell for TCU and West Virginia.
For swimming and diving, track and field, lacrosse, field hockey and so many other sports, all decisions come down to what is best for the athletic department’s No. 1 priority, which is almost always football. That’s the sport that drives revenue with massive television deals. The SEC has an exclusive deal with Disney’s ESPN and ABC while the Big Ten’s primary partner if FOX Sports with CBS and NBC also affiliated with the league. Every football-playing school dreams to be in one of those conferences, even those in the still-successful ACC and Big 12.
Football brings in the most money, with men’s basketball a distant second and women’s basketball even further back in third place. Certain universities have other programs like baseball, volleyball or lacrosse with strong followings, but demand for those sports still lags massively. Collegiately, even swimming’s Olympic brethren like track and gymnastics get better platforms.
As for other potential opportunities outside of the established system, when have those ever worked out? The latest brainchild is the College Swimming League, set to debut next fall with fan-focused, made-for-broadcast meets featuring 12 top programs, building off the CSCAA Dual Meet Challenge held last November. Intriguing? Absolutely. Revolutionary? Skeptical.
This new concept framed itself as a spin-off from the International Swimming League, launched on the same premise before holding competitions in 2019, 2020 and 2021. The league brought opportunities for professional swimmers, especially those stuck in the middle and unsure of whether they could continue their careers post-college, and it provided a welcome return to competition in the fall of 2020 after the COVID-19 pandemic forced the cancellation of almost all other big meets that year.
But the ISL never locked up the significant TV contract it promised; a deal for coverage on CBS Sports Network in 2019 was not renewed. In early 2022, the league announced an ambitious expansion plan, only to reverse course and cease operations shortly thereafter. Years later, swimmers and vendors were still awaiting their payments from the 2021 campaign. The delays were attributed to founder Konstantin Grigorishin encountering financial issues following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but even before the war, the league was far from profitable.
Even if the CSL outlasts its predecessor and becomes a solid staple in college swimming, there’s virtually no scenario where it provides funding for swimming that athletic departments cannot. Despite the best efforts of so many throughout the sport over the past two decades, swimming has been unable to establish a mainstream foothold outside the Olympic season.
The sobering reality is that football remains college swimming’s saving grace. Were college swimming on its own, some programs with strong history, strong endowments and strong alumni bases would survive, but the rest would be left at the discretion of their increasingly-fickle athletic departments. Awkward as it finds the current set up, college swimming needs its nonsensical conferences.
