Swimming and Diving Heads to Big Ten Championships

Wednesday, February 18

Minneapolis, Minn.

5:00 PM

Rutgers University

Big Ten Championships

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Photo by: Dakota Moyer

Swimming and Diving Heads to Big Ten Championships

Feb 16 | Women's Swimming & Diving

Live Results - Swimming Live Results - Diving Championship Homepage Live Stream on B1G+Meet Info

Competition Takes Place Wednesday-Saturday In Minneapolis

PISCATAWAY, N.J. – The Rutgers swimming and diving team is set to compete this week at the 2026 Big Ten Women's Swimming & Diving Championships, hosted by the University of Minnesota at the Jean K. Freeman Aquatic Center. Competition begins on Wednesday evening and stretches through Saturday.

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Live results (Swimming) | Live Results (Diving) | Live Stream (B1G+) | Championship Homepage | Championship Website

Schedule of Events

Wednesday – 5 pm

200 Medley Relay
800 Free Relay
Exhibition Team Diving Event

Thursday – 11 am Prelims | 6 pm Finals

100 Butterfly
400 IM
200 Freestyle
100 Breaststroke
1 Meter Diving
200 Freestyle Relay

Friday – 11 am Prelims | 6 pm Finals

100 Backstroke
200 Breaststroke
500 Freestyle
50 Freestyle
3 Meter Diving
400 Medley Relay

Saturday – 11 am Prelims | 6 pm Finals

200 IM
100 Freestyle
200 Butterfly
200 Backstroke
Platform Diving
1650 Freestyle
400 Freestyle Relay

About Rutgers

The Scarlet Knights have had a competitive schedule leading up this meet, dating back to October, opening the season with a win in a tri-meet against St. Bonaventure and Fordham, leading into a dual win over La Salle in January on Senior Day. RU has also competed against Arkansas, Miami, Princeton and Nebraska, while traveling to the Minnesota Invite. The divers specifically went to the Naval Academy Invite and hosted the Rutgers Platform Invitational most recently on February 7, where Katerina Hoffman took the crown.

The diving squad has been one of the best diving groups in the nation this season. In the most recent US PDCA poll released in December, Rutgers ranked eighth nationally in diving, while ranking fifth in the team championship power rankings. Katerina Hoffman, Bailee Sturgill and Sephora Ford are all projected as top-eight Big Ten scorers in the power ranking projections.

Rutgers excelled in the classroom this fall as well. The team was named a Scholar All-America team by the CSCAA and had a semester GPA of 3.398 with six 4.0 students and 12 on the Dean's List.

Big Ten Championships History

The Scarlet Knights will be competing in the Big Ten Championships for the 11^th time since joining the conference. Their best team finish previously is eighth place, done three times, most recently in 2022.

The Scarlet Knights have six Big Ten medalists, all coming between 2018 and 2020, with three swimmers (Vera Koprivova – two bronze in 2019 in the 100/200 back, Francesca Stoppa – bronze in 2019 in the 200 fly and Tereza Grusova – silver in 2020 in the 100 back) and one diver (Addison Walkowiak – silver in the 1M and bronze in the 3M dive in 2018).

The team's most recent top-five finish came in 2024, when the 400 medley relay team of Valeria Egorova, Tina Celik, Martyna Piesko and Jade Smits came in fifth. RU also had a fourth place finish by Abigail Knapton in 2022 in 3-meter diving. Overall, RU has 12 top-five finishes and 53 podium finishes.

The Scarlet Knights have two All-Big Ten selections (the two silver medalists, Walkowiak and Grusova), and one Big Ten All-Freshman (Bailee Sturgill last year).

Last year's performance at the Big Ten Championships in Columbus was highlighted by

Bailee Sturgill reaching the podium in the 1M dive (seventh place) and podium (eighth place), as she was named an All-Big Ten Freshman
Two B finals for graduated Molly Urkiel
Multiple consolation finals in diving and a second place finish in the team diving event

This year, there are six Big Ten swimming programs ranked in the CSCAA Top-25 poll as of February 5. That group includes No. 4 Michigan, No. 6 Indiana, No. 11 Ohio State, No. 15 Wisconsin, No. 22 UCLA and No. 25 Minnesota. On the diving side, Purdue (2), Minnesota (4), Indiana (6), Ohio State (7), Nebraska (20) and UCLA (23) appear in the Pro Diving Coach poll.

Top-10 Tracker

Rutgers has set 13 new marks on the program's all-time top-10 lists this season. Anna Vlachou leads the way with three. Nine of them are on the swimming side, with four new marks on the diving boards. Three of them reached the top-3 all-time, while five of them are among the four fastest.

Swimming

Ana Hazlehurst, 400 IM: 4:16.57, Fourth
Anna Vlachou, 100 Butterfly: 53.25, Fourth
Anna Vlachou, 100 Free: 49.20, Third
Emilianna Gonzalez, 50 Free: 22.40, 2^nd
Anna Vlachou, 50 Free: 22.67, 7th
Cameron Kuriger, 200 Butterfly: 1:59.58, Eighth
Ana Hazlehurst, 200 IM: 2:00.41, Third
Ellie Schinsky, 100 Butterfly: 54.01, Ninth
Angelica Bath, 200 Back: 1:58.62, Tenth

Diving

Sephora Ford, Platform: 317.7, Second
Sephora Ford, 3M, 332.03, Ninth
Bailee Sturgill, 3-Meter: 337.73, Eighth
Amelia Scott, Platform: 238.80, Tenth

Up Next

The Big Ten Championships will be followed in March by the ECAC Last Chance Meet (March 6-8) as RU gears up towards NCAA Championships, with the NCAA Zone A Championships held March 9-11 and the NCAA Championships in Atlanta from March 18-21.