With many schools reopening their campuses in a few weeks, it’s time for NCAA preview season. Here are the 9th through 12th ranked recruiting classes for this fall.
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Some important notes about our rankings:
- The rankings listed are based on our Class of 2024 Re-Rank. “HM” refers to our honorable mentions and “BOTR” refers to our The best of the rest Area for top recruits.
- Like most of our rankings, these placings are subjective. We base our team rankings on a number of factors: the candidates’ upcoming times are by far the most important factor, but we also consider potential upside in the class, class size, relay impact, and meeting team needs. Greater weight is placed on known short-course success, so foreign swimmers are slightly downgraded due to the difficulty of converting long-course times into short-course performances.
- Transfers are taken into account, but have less weight than recruits who have already been eligible to play for four seasons.
- Click here to see the full list of all athletes who have verbally committed. A huge thank you to Anne Lepesant of SwimSwam for compiling this index – without it, rankings like this would be far less comprehensive.
- Some teams had not released their final 2024-25 rosters at the time of publishing these articles, so it’s possible we missed some names. Let us know in the comments below.
BEST NCAA SWIMMING & DIVING RECRUITMENT CLASSES: WOMEN’S CLASS OF 2024
Previous placement:
- #16 Georgia
- #15 Virginia Tech
- #14 Auburn
- #13 Northwest
#12 Indiana
The Delmas twins deferred their enrollment and are the biggest newcomers to the class, along with Texas A&M transfer Miranda Grana. The class brings needed options in breaststroke and butterfly, but has someone from every discipline.
Justine Delmas competes with personal bests of 1:08.25 in the LCM 100 breaststroke and 2:25.12 in the LCM 200 breaststroke. These equate to 59.68 in the 100 and 2:07.13 in the 200. Indiana has a long history in breaststroke and is still home to names like Lilly Koenig, Josh Mathenyand also welcomes Brian Benzing. The team had only one sub-1:00 and sub-2:10 breaststroke swimmer last season, so Justine will be a big part of the backup and relays.
Twin sister Lucie Delmas is primarily a butterfly swimmer. Her best times come from 2021 with 59.02 in the 100m and 2:10.42 in the 200m, both LCM times. Those compare to 51.90 in the 100m and 1:54.97 in the 200m, with the 200m time being faster than the time needed for NCAAs and the 100m time just on the cutoff. There were no butterfly swimmers under 52 and only one swimmer in the 200m at NCAAs last season, so she fills a much-needed void.
Mary Cespedes is a freshman in the state and has SCY bests of 1:01.42 in the 100 and 2:14.35 in the 200, although her long course best of 1:08.81 suggests she has more potential in the SCY pool. Daniela Karnaugh also has roughly the same bests in the breaststroke events with SCY bests of 1:01.50 in the 100 and 2:13.58 in the 200.
Miranda Grana finished 6th in the 200 backstroke (1:51.96) and 8th in the 100 backstroke (51.65) at the 2024 NCAAs and has 3 years left in her after spending one season at Texas A&M. She also has a best of 51.32 in the butterfly, which is huge for the medley relay since they still have Kacey McKenna for the backstroke leg.
#11 Florida
It’s a small class for the Gators and loaded with butterfly and IM swimmers, but it has the strength it needs after coming on the heels of the nation’s No. 1 class a year ago. The fifth-graders also give the team some temporary reinforcements ahead of another big class in 2025.
Julie Brousseau represented Canada at the Paris Olympics, running a time of 1:57.93 in the 4×200 freestyle relay. Her best time in the flat start is 1:57.60, a time that converts to 1:43.06, a time that benefits the lead of Isabel Ivey, who ran a flying start of 1:41.64 in the team’s NCAA-winning 800 freestyle relay last year, the only relay Virginia did not win. Brousseau also brings a time of 4:08.12 in the 400 freestyle relay (converts to 4:38.00) and a time of 2:13.66 in the 200 medley relay (converts to 1:57.53).
Sofia Plaza is the best local newcomer and has already come close to scoring points in the 400m individual medley with a best time of 4:08.64. She was also fast in the 200m individual medley with 1:59.04 and the 200m breaststroke with 2:10.55.
Another IM participant is Gracie Weyant, the younger sister of the Olympic medalist from Tokyo and Paris Emma Weyantalso brings depth to the IM group with personal bests of 1:58.6 in the 200m and 4:16.9 in the 400m. Nicole Maier, who transferred from Miami-OH, reached the B final of the 400m IM at the last two NCAA Championships and has 1 year left in her career.
Julia Heimstead is also taking part for the fifth year, providing additional strength in the butterfly swimming with personal bests of 51.61 over 100 m and 1:54.57 over 200 m. Addison Reese also strengthens the butterfly group with personal bests of 52.9 over 100 m and 1:55.9 over 200 m.
#10 Michigan Wolverines
Diaconescu lost a tremendous amount of time her senior year and brings NCAA potential in the distance freestyle, with elevation-adjusted bests of 4:46.19 in the 500 and 16:04.73 in the 1650. The team only had 1 swimmer in the 1650 last season and Kathryn Shanley begins her senior year this fall and finished 35th at NCAAs with a 16:17.25.
Ploeger also brings more depth to the distance free run with personal bests of 4:45.10 in the 500m and 16:04.40 in the 1650m. Diaconescu and Ploeger come in at just the right time to add a year of depth to the run until Shanley leaves. The distance free run was one of the team’s weakest links last season, but that appears to be changing this season.
Flack is from Canada and has already broken the 1:00 mark in the 100-meter butterfly with a time of 59.44, which equates to 52.28, a time on the border of the NCAA invitational range. She also has the potential to be an option for the team’s sprint freestyle relays, with best times of 25.55 in the 50-meter dash (converted to 22.29) and 56.35 in the 100-meter dash (49.32). The sprint group has been very successful in its first year under head coach Matt Bowe alongside Bryon Tansel.
Josie Connelly also joins the sprint group. The in-state talent has already clocked 22.25 seconds in the 50 and 49.66 seconds in the 100. Connelly and Flack may not swim in the 200 freestyle relay this year, as they are running all four heats after finishing fourth at NCAAs, but two of them (Claire Newman and Lindsay Flynn) will graduate at the end of the season.
#9 Ohio State
- Top newcomers: Emma Finlin (Canada, distance freestyle), Maria Ramos (Spain, breaststroke), Delia Lloyd (Canada, sprint freestyle/backstroke), Sienna Angove (Canada, Mid-D freestyle), Erin Little (Great Britain, sprint freestyle), BOTR Mila Nikanorov (distance freestyle), BOTR Rachel Bockrath (sprint freestyle), Ava DeAngelis (transfer from George Washington – breaststroke)
- The “rest”: Susie Lee (distance freestyle/backstroke), Danika Varda (breaststroke), Elise Nardozzi (sprint freestyle/backstroke), Nell Cagle (breaststroke), Tia Lindsay (transfer from Arizona, IM)
Ohio State has a big class coming up, but it needed to, as it had 14 seniors and fifth-years last season. It’s a class with a lot of international players and a lot of talent that may have to adapt to the short haul.
The first Canadian is Emma Finlin, who represented the country at the 2023 World Championships in the 800 and 1500 freestyle, setting personal bests of 8:36.47 in the 800 and 16:15.77 in the 1500. With the 1000m not contested at the NCAA Championships, her 1500m freestyle is the key event for her, placing her 1st to 8th at the NCAAs in 15:56.63.
The other Canadian is Delia Lloyd, who swam at the 2023 World Junior Championships. In late July, she swam personal bests of 25.29 in the LCM 50 freestyle and 55.01 in the 100, times that convert to 22.06 and 48.11. Both are close to the NCAA scoring range but have already made an impact at the relay level, especially after Amy Fulmer’s retirement. Lloyd is also strong in the backstroke events with a 1:00.43 in the LCM 100 backstroke and a 2:11.74 in the 200. Those times equate to 53.36 and 1:56.52, both of which are outside the NCAA invitational range but have the potential to be a third-place event.
The third Canadian is Sienna Angove, who swam numerous personal bests at the 2024 Canadian Trials, including 25.54 in the LCM 50 freestyle, 54.89 in the 100 and 1:58.53 in the 200. Her 100 is 48.00 and her 200 is 1:43.90. Like Lloyd, her 100 time is just off the mark, but her 200 is borderline. Her relay potential is huge, especially in the 800 freestyle relay, where the team finished 16th at NCAAs, their lowest-scoring relay.
Britain’s Anna Little also brings sprinting strength with LCM bests of 25.73, 55.46 and 2:01.37. These convert to 22.45, 49.43 and 1:46.45. Although they are not as fast as Lloyd or Angove, they bring the depth the team needs after this year, as Kit Kat Zenick, Nyah Funderburke and Teresa Ivan will spend their final season with the team in the fall.
Spain’s Maria Ramos comes into the breaststroke group at the right time, having lost Hannah Bach and Josie Panitz in the offseason when they finished their fifth year last season. Ramos has PRs of 29.73 in the SCM 50 breaststroke and 1:05.28 in the 100 breaststroke, which are 26.78 and 58.81, respectively. Bach was one of the fastest 50 breaststroke swimmers of all time, posting a time of 25.68 at the 2024 NCAAs, helping the team to a 2nd place finish. While Ramos may not be at 25.68 yet, she has the potential to develop into that range. However, she already has the potential to make the “B” final in the 100 breaststroke.
The two best local newcomers give the class even more freestyle depth. Rachel Bockrath has personal bests of 22.7 in the 50 m, 49.0 in the 100 m and 1:45.9 in the 200 m. The 200 m is the key for her relay. Mila Nikanorov provides distance depth. Her strongest disciplines are the 500 m and 1500 m freestyle, where she has personal bests of 4:42.4 and 16:17 in the 1650 m.
