MINNEAPOLIS – Top-ranked Stanford opened the NCAA Men's Swimming and Diving Championships with an eighth-place finish in the 800-yard freestyle relay on Wednesday night at the Jean K. Freeman Aquatic Center.
"We performed as planned and dropped over three seconds from our time at Pac-12's," said Goldman Family Director of Men's Swimming Ted Knapp. "We're on the path to more success this week if we continue to swim the races we rehearsed."
Stanford's quartet of Abrahm DeVine, Liam Egan, James Murphy and Grant Shoults (6:14.75) entered the finals ranked 13th on the psych sheet, swimming Lane 2 of Heat 2. DeVine (1:32.77) took Stanford out in a hurry, swimming the second-fastest 200-yard freestyle leg in school history. Egan followed it up with 1:33.96 in the second leg, followed by Murphy (1:34.81) and Shoults (1:33.21), who swam the anchor.
North Carolina State won the event and sits atop the leaderboard after Day 1. Stanford (22 points) sits in eight place behind the Wolfpack (40), Indiana (34), Texas (32), Florida (30), Georgia (28), California (26) and Louisville (24).
Tomorrow's preliminary swims, which start at 8 a.m. PT, include the 500-yard freestyle, 200-yard individual medley, 50-yard freestyle, 200-yard freestyle relay, 400-yard medley relay and 1-meter springboard.
- Grant Shoults (4:11.34), the Pac-12 champion in the 500 free, enters with the fifth-fastest time in the nation. Last season, Shoults finished fourth in the event with a program-record 4:10.23 in the finals.
- DeVine (1:41.17) owns the program record and the third-fastest time in the country in the 200 IM. DeVine captured the Pac-12 crown three weeks ago after finishing 11th in the event in each of his first two NCAA meets.\