“Hopefully we’ll have Laurin Williams going to the NCAA championships,” said Ohio coach Greg Werner after the last day of the Mid-American Conference championships this past weekend.
While everyone else is still on spring break, the junior went back to Athens to practice for a possible NCAA tournament appearance in Indianapolis, Ind., in two weeks without knowing for sure whether she would receive an invitation to the 1650-yard freestyle finals.
Since Thursday night, however, Williams can be rest assured that she will swim among the nation’s best after the official NCAA meet selection list was published.
The distance stand-out beat the 1650-yard freestyle NCAA b-cut last weekend at the MAC championships by swimming a time of 16:14.60 minutes to win the individual title. Her time was just 0.58 seconds off her own school record and was nine seconds faster than second placed Briana Emig of Eastern Michigan.
Still, Williams is expected to face a much tougher competition at the NCAA tournament. Her time is seeded 30th out of 38.
“(My goal is) to stay at my ranking or move on,” Williams said adding that she finished 23rd last year. “Usually people don’t swim as fast at their conference meets. Hopefully – if I stay at my same time – I can get (into the) top 16 which would be amazing.”
Lauren Funk, Addy Ferguson and Tori Bagan, who also beat the NCAA b-cut last weekend, did not receive an invitation to the NCAA tournament, as their times were not ranked high enough to be considered.
am794811@ohiou.edu
