Last weekend at the NCAA championships in Federal Way, Wash., Northwestern produced one of its best meets of the year.
With only four swimmers competing, the Wildcats finished a solid 12th place out of 41 teams, providing a promising ending to an up and down season. The Cats also helped silence critics who said the team couldn’t compete without highly departed stars, Matt Grevers and Mike Alexandrov.
“I was very proud of our team,” junior Eric Nilsson said. “We proved that we are still a force despite losing last year’s superstar class.”
While NU may not have repeated last year’s sixth-place finish, in many ways this season’s result is equally impressive.
The four-man team of Nilsson, seniors Bruno Barbic and Kyle Bubolz and freshman Brian Kerr battled against the country’s top teams, producing five career-best times and 13 All-American honors.
“For only having a four person team, a 12th place finish was a huge accomplishment,” Kerr said. “I think it’s as big a deal as last year.”
In the most exciting race of the weekend, the 400-meter freestyle relay, the Cats showed a determination that had been missing for much of the season. Needing a strong finish to overcome Texas A&M, NU placed seventh with a time of 2:55.06 to jump the Aggies in the standings.
“Getting seventh in the 400 free relay at the end of the meet was very exciting,” Nilsson said.
In some ways, the weekend was bittersweet, signaling the end of the prolific collegiate careers of Kyle Bubolz and Bruno Barbic, who both took advantage of one last racing opportunity.
In addition to two strong relay performances, Barbic scored points with two season-best swims in the 50- and 100-meter freestyle, where he finished 10th and 13th. He earned four All-American honors, pushing his career total to 10: Nine at NU and one at the University of Washington.
Bubolz matched last year’s fourth-place finish in the 100-meter butterfly, breaking his own school record with a time of 45.74. He also set personal-bests in the 50- and 100-meter freestyle, finishing ninth and seventh, respectively. Over the weekend, he added five more All-American titles, giving him 19 on his career – the third-highest total in NU history.
Even with the departure of Bubolz and Barbic, performances by Eric Nilsson and Brian Kerr provided a glimpse at next year’s squad.
While Nilsson failed to earn an individual All-American honor, he swam career-bests in the 200-meter freestyle, 200-meter butterfly and the first leg of the 400-meter freestyle relay.
“I didn’t have all the swims I wanted to and things didn’t go perfectly,” he said. “But I was definitely happy with the team performance and am very excited for next year.”
A big part of NU’s future relies on some of the Cats’ younger swimmers like Kerr, the only underclassman at the event. While he didn’t participate in individual competition, he was a key part of NU’s strong relay performances.
“Swimming at the NCAAs for the first time was a great experience,” Kerr said. “I got a real sense for what level of preparation is necessary to compete at the highest level.”
While NU is losing two of its best swimmers, next year’s team could easily find itself in a position to top this year’s strong results.
