No. 21 Northwestern men’s swim and dive wrapped up a historic season at NCAA Division I Championships on Friday night, placing 26th after breaking four new school records at the McAuley Aquatic Center for its best finish at the meet since 2008.
Down in Atlanta, the Wildcats were led by star swimmers Stuart Seymour and Joshua Staples, who combined for three individual school records and three top-16 finishes in individual events. Staples logged the Northwestern’s best individual finish of the weekend,
placing eighth in the 400-yard individual medley to become the first Wildcat since Jordan Wilimovsky in 2017 to make the A-final in an event at NCAAs. Meanwhile, Seymour set school records in the 100-yard backstroke and 100-yard freestyle events, while contributing to the ‘Cats’ school record setting 400-yard freestyle relay.
In the broader scheme of the meet, the Texas Longhorns, led by legendary head coach Bob Bowman, won their second-consecutive national championship, with a scoring total of 445.5. The Longhorns were followed by the Florida Gators, who took second, and the Big Ten champion Indiana Hoosiers, who took third. Florida’s Josh Liendo won high point of the meet, powered by his 42.49 in the 100-yard butterfly which shattered Caeleb Dressel’s legendary NCAA-record in the event. Texas’ Hubert Kos, brother of Northwestern’s very own Oliver Kos, placed second in the high point standings, setting NCAA-records in both the 100- and 200-yard backstroke events. Arizona State’s Ilya Kharun placed third.
Results for the NCAA Division I Championships can be found on the Meet Mobile app or on SwimCloud’s meet page for the event.
Meet Recap
After not scoring at NCAAs in 2025, Northwestern placed 26th at the championships this year with a total of 39 points. The ‘Cats’ 26th-place finish was its highest since 2008, when Northwestern finished 12th at NCAAs with a Matt Grevers-led unit.
Northwestern was led by its star sophomore talent Joshua Staples, who became the first ’Cat to reach the A-final in the 400-yard individual medley since 2004. Staples’ school record 3:36.58 in prelims seeded him third-place in the event entering finals. Had he matched his time in finals, he would’ve placed sixth. However, the Aussie ended up adding 6.33 seconds to his prelims swim, finishing eighth in the event.
Seemingly, Staples suffered from an injury of some sort following his prelims swim in the 400-yard individual medley. The Brisbane-native was not the same swimmer in his consequent individual swims, adding significant time not only in his finals swim of the 400-yard individual medley, but also his 2oo-yard individual medley prelims swim on day four of the meet, where he clocked a 1:47.96 — over six seconds off of his personal best. Though, his 50.46-split in the 100-yard breastroke as a part of the ‘Cats’ 400-yard medley relay was a competitive time, so perhaps Staples was just battling fatigue in his other individual swims.
Seymour was the Wildcats’ other standout individual performer. The junior gained All-American honorable mention status with top-16 finishes in both the 100-yard butterfly (15th) and 100-yard backstroke (11th). Furthermore, Seymour set two new school records in Atlanta with a 44.55 in the 100-yard backstroke and 41.76 in the 100-yard freestyle.
Though Staples and Seymour were the ‘Cats’ only individual point scorers, there were other notable individual performances. Adam Cohen had a solid performance in platform diving, placing 17th with a score of 348.30. Additionally, Oliver Kos placed 18th in the 200-yard backstroke with a time of 1:39.50 and David Gerchik placed 28th in the 100-yard backstroke with a personal best 45.37.
Northwestern also scored points in both the 400-yard medley relay and 400-yard freestyle relay. The 400-yard freestyle relay was a highlight event of the meet for the ‘Cats, with Seymour, Cade Duncan, Connor Schuster and Kos teaming up to post a school record time of 2:47.72, placing 12th in the event. Meanwhile, Seymour, Staples, Schuster and Duncan teamed up in the 400-yard medley relay to place 12th with a time of 3:02.18.
One Big Observation
It’s hard to truly contextualize how incredible of a breakthrough this season was for Northwestern men’s swim and dive.
After grand successes in the Matt Grevers years at the end of the 2000s, the ‘Cats slowly declined. For almost a decade, they sent small contingents to NCAAs, sometimes stumbling upon a breakout swimmer like Jordan Wilimovsky who would score them some points, but most time failing to score at the NCAAs at all. Northwestern hit rock bottom at the end of the 2010s, sending zero swimmers to NCAAs for two-consecutive years in 2018 and 2019. The program was broken, with no resemblance to the team that placed eighth at NCAAs in 2007.
Just last year, Northwestern was still nowhere close to national relevance. Despite sending a contingent of four individual swimmers to NCAAs, the ‘Cats went scoreless at the competition, with Seymour just missing out on a B-final swim with a 17th-place 45.22 in the 100-yard backstroke. Amazingly, Staples didn’t even swim the 400-yard individual medley event until this season. Staples was purely a distance freestyler and swam the 1650-yard freestyle and 500-yard freestyle at NCAAs.
With core swimmers like Seymour, Staples and Gerchik still young, it seemed clear that Northwestern had the chance to make strides in the 2025-26 season. However, if you had told head coach Rachel Stratton-Mills that Joshua Staples was going to A-final in the 400-yard individual medley — not a distance freestyle event — at NCAAs AND that her squad was going to place 26th, she would have called you crazy.
For the first time in almost two decades, it finally feels fair to say that Northwestern is relevant on the national scene. The ‘Cats 26th place finish is the program’s best since Grevers’ final season in 2008. In a sport driven by star power, Northwestern finally has found national-level talent. The ‘Cats had not one, but two individual point scorers at NCAAs in Staples and Seymour. As mentioned earlier, Staples, who is only a sophomore, became the ‘Cats’ first A-finalist in ANY event since Jordan Wilimovsky in 2017.
The tides are finally changing in Evanston. Stratton-Mills has done an incredible job with this team and the program should only continue to grow. With impact NCAA-qualifiers Staples, Seymour, Kos and Duncan all returning next year to swim alongside a high-level incoming recruiting class, make it be known: the ‘Cats are coming.
