For the previous two years, a freshman male dash expertise has emerged from the College of Tennessee. Throughout the 2021-22 NCAA season, it was Jordan Crooks from the Cayman Islands. Crooks took the NCAA by storm on the 2022 SEC Championships, successful the 50 free and surpassing Caeleb Dressel to change into the (then) quickest freshman ever within the occasion. Then, a 12 months later it was Gui Caribe from Brazil. Caribe, like Crooks, wasn’t on the radars of many coming into the 2022-23 season, however then he went on to attain 20 factors at NCAAs and have become an enormous asset for Tennessee relays.
Headed into this upcoming NCAA season, we’d have already got an thought of who Tennessee’s subsequent freshman dash standout is. As soon as once more, he’s a global swimmer from the Caribbean/South America area, and his identify is Nikoli Blackman. Blackman is a part of Tennessee’s class of 2027 and is about to return to Knoxville this fall.
Blackman, who represents Trinidad and Tobago internationally, confirmed his potential lately on the 2023 World Junior Championships. He first upset pre-meet favourite Flynn Southam to seize a gold medal within the 50 free with a time of twenty-two.35, although he set his greatest time of twenty-two.33 within the semi-finals. Then, he completed sixth within the 100 free ultimate, setting one other greatest time of 49.54. These occasions transformed to yards utilizing SwimSwam’s Traditional Converter are 19.41 and 43.90, that are fairly respectable for an incoming freshman.
Clearly, lengthy course to quick course conversions aren’t probably the most correct, so we additionally transformed his quick course meters greatest occasions into yards—these conversions produce barely slower however related outcomes.
Nickoli Blackman’s LCM To SCY Time Conversions:
| LCM | SCY | |
| 50 Free | 22.33 | 19.41 |
| 100 Free | 49.54 | 43.90 |
Nickoli Blackman’s SCM To SCY Time Conversions:
| SCM | SCY | |
| 50 Free | 21.92 | 19.74 |
| 100 Free | 48.98 | 44.12 |
Clearly, it’s exhausting to foretell Blackman’s NCAA trajectory, as it’s for all freshmen. However it’s price noting that he’s quicker than Crooks popping out of highschool in each lengthy course and quick course (Crooks had pre-college PBs of twenty-two.97/50.25 in lengthy course and 22.02/49.47 briefly course). As well as, his lengthy course 50 free greatest time is true 0n Caribe’s highschool greatest (22.35), although his 100 free time is almost a second slower (Caribe’s highschool greatest was 48.71).
Word: Caribe doesn’t have any quick course meters occasions entered for him.
Blackman can also be youthful than Crooks was when he first got here into the NCAA, as he simply turned 18 on June 22 of this 12 months. In the meantime, Crooks and Caribe have been each 19 once they arrived in Tennessee. That implies that Blackman is already forward of the curve by way of the Tennessee enchancment trajectory, although we all know that being quick at a youthful age doesn’t essentially imply {that a} swimmer will proceed to achieve velocity exponentially all through the years.
As soon as once more, it’s tough to foresee how Blackman will find yourself in school. However given what Tennessee has achieved to different worldwide male dash recruits that got here earlier than him, he’s price maintaining a tally of.
