Both teams were strong favorites for the SEC titles, and delivered. Similar script for the women and men - Tennessee and Florida both have some stars and incredible relays but didn't have the depth to keep up with Texas. Now the mystery is how much improvement we will see at the NCAA championships next month.
Capitani's teams are often pretty flat between conference and NCAAs. But the Texas women are a talented and well balanced team. Barring a catastrophic collapse, they are a lock for 2nd place at NCAAs. Virginia's team could catch norovirus the day of NCAAs and still win.
The men have more variance, with a much better shot at the NCAA title but also a strong chance of falling to 3rd place. Bowman's squads haven't reliably peaked at NCAAs like we got used to with Eddie's Texas teams in the past. Texas has the talent to win but will need to fire on all cylinders to beat Indiana and Cal at NCAAs, after both bolstered their rosters by adding Olympians this spring semester. This annoyingly includes Texas alum and Olympic medalist Caspar Corbeau who made a surprise return to NCAAs after graduating in 2023, swimming now for Indiana (rumor is Texas was concerned about his eligibility so he looked elsewhere). Texas also played the spring addition game, but one of ours didn't materialize, as Polish Olympian Ksawery Masiuk is now slated to join in the fall instead. The NCAA championships format rewards sprint heavy teams because of the importance of relays, and that is our weakness (as evidenced by these SEC championships, where we won the meet handily but went 0/5 in relay titles). It's going to be very tight.