AUBURN, Ala. – Championship season has arrived. The Auburn swimming and diving team will travel to Knoxville, Tennessee, this week to compete in the 2022 SEC S&D Championships. The meet will begin Tuesday and run through the Saturday.
It will be the first SEC Championships for Ryan Wochomurka as the Auburn head coach. Wochomurka won four SEC titles with the Tigers as a swimmer.
"It's championship season," Wochomurka said. "The lights are just a little bit brighter in a championship format. It's time to show the work that we've done all year long. It's really a showcase of the things we've done from a training standpoint for our kids and an opportunity to qualify and advance to the NCAA Championships in March."
This year's SEC meet will go back to the traditional format where the men and women compete simultaneously over the course of five days. They were split up into two separate meets last year because of COVID-19 protocols.
Auburn comes in with both teams ranked in the top 20 by CSCAA. The men are at No. 16 nationally while the women check in at No. 18. Both teams went 2-5 in dual meets, but they have achieved a combined 88 NCAA B-cuts thus far and also earned A-cuts in three relays – the men's and women's 200 freestyle relay and the men's 200 medley relay.
The Tigers are hoping to improve on last year's performance where the men finished eighth and the women took ninth – the lowest finish in school history.
"The message for our group this year is we don't need the planets to align 100 percent," Wochomurka said. "We're not looking for perfection. We're looking for execution on the things that we've done all year long.
"And then who is going to be the person that has an igniting performance that kind of kicks the meet off for us? Who is going to carry that emotion into an exceptional performance – that we know they're capable of – that is going to inspire their teammates? That's what we're looking for. Having this group begin to really inspire each other.
"We've seen that so far, but at a meet like this – it's just like any other game of basketball or football – you gain momentum. And so we're looking for the igniting performances, the inspiring performances that really build the momentum to carry us through the week."
The SEC meet will begin Tuesday with the 200 medley and 800 free relays along with the women's 1-meter and men's 3-meter diving competitions. Prelims for diving begin at 9:30 a.m. CT with the finals session starting at 3:20 p.m. CT.
For the remainder of the meet, prelims will begin at 9:30 a.m. CT and finals at 4:30 p.m. CT.
The SEC Network and SECN+ will broadcast all of the sessions live online.
SCHEDULE
Tuesday
Women's 1-Meter, 200 Medley Relay, Men's 3-Meter, 800 Free Relay
Watch: Prelims | Finals
Wednesday
200 Free Relay, 500 Free, 200 IM, 50 Free, Men's 1-Meter
Thursday
400 IM, 100 Fly, 200 Free, Women's 3-Meter
Friday
200 Fly, 100 Back, 100 Breast, Men's Platform, 400 Medley Relay
Saturday
1650 Free, 200 Back, 100 Free, 200 Breast, Women's Platform, 400 Free Relay
Auburn S&D embraces opportunity at SEC Championships
