Championship Swimming Starts Thursday

At the Big East Met last month UC's Josh Schneier was named the conferences most outstanding men's swimmer.    The junior from Taylor High School won three individual events at the conference meet, the 100 meter freestyle, the 50 meter freestyle and the 100 meter butterfly.   This weekend Schneider will be representing UC in those three events at the NCAA championship meet in College Station, Texas.   

According to collegeswimming.com Schneider has one of the top 10 times in the country for the 50 meter free style:

#6.  Josh Schneider    Cincinnati    19.17

Click here to see how Schneider's best times in the other events he will be competing in:  CLICK HERE.

Check back here for updates on how UC's top swimmer does in college swimming's top event.

Last summer Schneider finished 16th in the Olympic Trials for the 50 meter freestyle.

Schneider Wins Big East

Junior Josh Schneider had high expectations for his team going into the Big East meet this week in Indianapolis.  He thought they could finish third, and he felt good about his own chances.  He was right on both.  The team is sitting in fourth place with two days of competition left and Schneider himself won the men's 50 meter free style event Thursday night.  In the preliminaries earlier in the day he set a school record, then backed it up that evening by just edging out the second place swimmer from Louisville by four tenths of a second.  The junior from Taylor High School won the same event last year.  This qualifies him for the NCAA meet, and his time of 19.38 is the third fastest in college swimming this year.   The men are currently 4th and the women sit in 8th.  Both have a great opportunity to improve on those places.  Bearcat Sports Page.com has a crew at the meet and will have video early next week.

Everybody Wants to Know

A month ago Mick Cronin was talking about how hard it is on family and friends when the negativity starts to surround the program.  It's difficult when everyone is asking " what's wrong with you guys?"   As of Thursday afternoon the "opposite problem" has popped up.  Now everyone wants to talk about how many games they need to win to get into the tournament.

Given the choice Coach Cronin and his team would much rather be talking about what it takes to make the tournament as opposed to what their plans are for spring break.

Someone else with a big game?

For the past month the football team has been able to say they were playing in the biggest game on campus.  Not that the Hawaii game isn't big, but this week that honor goes to the volleyball team as they enter post season play.  Sunday night they were selected and given an at large bid to the NCAA Tournament.  After winning 25 games and a share of the Big East title they were waiting on pins and needles during the selection show because they lost in the opening round of the conference tournament.  But, the committee saw two months of perfect play by the Bearcats, not one bad day.

 

The first round game comes against Western Kentucky Friday afternoon at 5:00, a team UC beat in four sets on the road back in October.   The first round games are being played in Champaign, Il.  A win Friday would likely have the Bearcats facing the #9 seeded Fighting Illini in the second round.