TEMPE, Ariz. – In their last competition this calendar year, the Sun Devils are branching out to two different meets in the Indiana Invitational and Texas Diving Invitational this week.
While swimming heads to Bloomington, the Sun Devil diving squad stays a little closer to home, heading to the Texas Diving Invitational in Austin. The meet will have six diving sessions spanning three days, with preliminaries beginning at 10 a.m. and finals at 5 p.m. each day. This format is similar to the NCAA National Championship, which gives the newer Sun Devil early experience with the format.
The Sun Devils have attended the invite on-and-off for the past 20 years, as it consistently features some of the top programs in the country. The invite includes top diving programs in Purdue, Tennessee and Texas, and will feature the NCAA Champion in both the 3M and Platform dives in Steele Johnson of Purdue and Brooke Schultz of Arkansas; and Colin Zeng of Tennessee, respectively.
"It will really be a test this early in the season to see how far we've come from when we started until now," diving coach Mark Bradshaw said. "It's the cream of the crop and the same divers that competed at the finals at the NCAA Championships last year."
Freshman Brandon Spencer and sophomore Ashley McCool have been standouts so for ASU, with Spencer notching a NCAA Zone qualifying score in the 3M in his first collegiate meet and McCool already qualifying for both springboard events through three meets this year.
"Brandon Spencer was very steady and consistent in his first dual meet last weekend," Bradshaw said. "Ashley has also been diving very well, although honestly she hasn't come close to what she can achieve. I'm excited to see how she'll do in this environment at Texas."
The Invitational also provides a valuable chance for the Sun Devils to achieve some qualifying scores in the platform event, a chance which otherwise only would have come at the Pac-12 Championships in February. The extra chance will give ASU the opportunity to see where they stand in the event against the best as well, as traditional regular season dual meets only include springboard events.
"The opportunities to compete in platform are few, so we use this as our one-time platform contest before we go to Pac-12's to see where we are and see where we need to improve," Bradshaw said. "We've been working hard on platform since we started, so it'll give us a chance to see if we've been working on the right things in practice."
While diving heads to Austin, swimming heads to the Hoosier state for the first annual Indiana Invitational, an event concocted by Sun Devil coach Bob Bowman and Indiana coach Ray Looze. The Invitational welcomes ASU, NC State, Louisville, Indiana and the Purdue women into the confines of the Counsilman-Billingsley Aquatics Center.
Similar to Austin, the invite features a morning-preliminary, evening-finals format with a full schedule linked above.
The Invitational features some of the top talent in the country, as all but one of the squads boasts a team ranked in the TYR Top-25 in at least one gender. This plethora of talent will provide the swimmers with ample opportunity to compete against some of the top swimmers in D1 swimming including several national champions in both genders.
Sun Devils Evan Carlson, Chloe Isleta and Zach Poti look to continue their dominance so far this season. Carlson has taken the top spot in every event he's raced in so far this season, spanning two entries in the 50 free and two in the 100 free.
Poti and Isleta have both dominated the backstroke events, with Poti sweeping the 100 and 200 back at Florida State and taking second in both events against USC. Isleta has six first-place finishes in backstroke events and two second place finishes through four meets this year.
Keep up with the action of Sun Devil swimming and diving by following @ASUSwimDive on Twitter. Both invitationals will feature live scoring, and each diving final will be streamed live on the Longhorn Network (ESPN).
While swimming heads to Bloomington, the Sun Devil diving squad stays a little closer to home, heading to the Texas Diving Invitational in Austin. The meet will have six diving sessions spanning three days, with preliminaries beginning at 10 a.m. and finals at 5 p.m. each day. This format is similar to the NCAA National Championship, which gives the newer Sun Devil early experience with the format.
The Sun Devils have attended the invite on-and-off for the past 20 years, as it consistently features some of the top programs in the country. The invite includes top diving programs in Purdue, Tennessee and Texas, and will feature the NCAA Champion in both the 3M and Platform dives in Steele Johnson of Purdue and Brooke Schultz of Arkansas; and Colin Zeng of Tennessee, respectively.
"It will really be a test this early in the season to see how far we've come from when we started until now," diving coach Mark Bradshaw said. "It's the cream of the crop and the same divers that competed at the finals at the NCAA Championships last year."
Freshman Brandon Spencer and sophomore Ashley McCool have been standouts so for ASU, with Spencer notching a NCAA Zone qualifying score in the 3M in his first collegiate meet and McCool already qualifying for both springboard events through three meets this year.
"Brandon Spencer was very steady and consistent in his first dual meet last weekend," Bradshaw said. "Ashley has also been diving very well, although honestly she hasn't come close to what she can achieve. I'm excited to see how she'll do in this environment at Texas."
The Invitational also provides a valuable chance for the Sun Devils to achieve some qualifying scores in the platform event, a chance which otherwise only would have come at the Pac-12 Championships in February. The extra chance will give ASU the opportunity to see where they stand in the event against the best as well, as traditional regular season dual meets only include springboard events.
"The opportunities to compete in platform are few, so we use this as our one-time platform contest before we go to Pac-12's to see where we are and see where we need to improve," Bradshaw said. "We've been working hard on platform since we started, so it'll give us a chance to see if we've been working on the right things in practice."
While diving heads to Austin, swimming heads to the Hoosier state for the first annual Indiana Invitational, an event concocted by Sun Devil coach Bob Bowman and Indiana coach Ray Looze. The Invitational welcomes ASU, NC State, Louisville, Indiana and the Purdue women into the confines of the Counsilman-Billingsley Aquatics Center.
Similar to Austin, the invite features a morning-preliminary, evening-finals format with a full schedule linked above.
The Invitational features some of the top talent in the country, as all but one of the squads boasts a team ranked in the TYR Top-25 in at least one gender. This plethora of talent will provide the swimmers with ample opportunity to compete against some of the top swimmers in D1 swimming including several national champions in both genders.
Sun Devils Evan Carlson, Chloe Isleta and Zach Poti look to continue their dominance so far this season. Carlson has taken the top spot in every event he's raced in so far this season, spanning two entries in the 50 free and two in the 100 free.
Poti and Isleta have both dominated the backstroke events, with Poti sweeping the 100 and 200 back at Florida State and taking second in both events against USC. Isleta has six first-place finishes in backstroke events and two second place finishes through four meets this year.
Keep up with the action of Sun Devil swimming and diving by following @ASUSwimDive on Twitter. Both invitationals will feature live scoring, and each diving final will be streamed live on the Longhorn Network (ESPN).