Swimming & Diving Preview: Blue Streaks Set for Life within the NCAC

UNIVERSITY HEIGHTS – The John Carroll Men’s and Women’s Swim & Dive applications have been completely dominant forces within the Ohio Athletic Conference over the previous decade, every profitable OAC crew titles for the previous 9 seasons. 

Under second 12 months head coach Mark de Swardt, the crew will look to proceed their success of their first season as members of the North Coast Athletic Conference. 

“I think it’s really exciting to be moving to the NCAC. I think that the OAC was great, but it wasn’t as much of a challenge as the NCAC’s going to be and I think the mindset of the athletes has changed knowing that I’ve got to put in the work during the season if I want to actually win a race at the end of the year,” stated de Swardt.

Coach de Swardt embraces the brand new degree of competitors, and is doing what he can to arrange his groups for the convention challenges.

“We’ve set our schedule to reflect that. So we’re racing those NCAC teams, we’re racing Cleveland State, which is a Division I team. We’re going to Bowling Green, another Division I team.”

De Swardt hopes giving the Blue Streaks a style of Division I competitors will put together them for the depth that the NCAC schedule will carry.

Luckily for John Carroll, each males’s and ladies’s groups will return the reigning OAC swimmers of the 12 months, Joe Nadur and Mairin Dalziel. 

“They’ve been just rocks on this team since before I got here. Joe Nadur can swim any event you ask him to do, and Mairin is the sprint queen here and I mean, you can even put her in the 500 and she’ll go crush it. So they’re both just cornerstones of the program who just bring energy every single day.”

Nadur is a multi-time OAC champion within the 200 Breaststroke, 200 IM, 400 IM, and 800 Freestyle Relay. Dalziel is a jack of all trades in her personal proper, snagging OAC titles within the 50 Freestyle, 100 Freestyle, 200 Freestyle, 800 Freestyle Relay, 200 Freestyle Relay, 200 Medley Relay, 400 Medley Relay, and the 400 Freestyle Relay throughout her JCU profession.

On the lads’s facet, Nadur isn’t the one acquainted face that can be again and contributing in a giant means for the Blue Streaks, because the squad can even return final 12 months’s NCAA particular person qualifier, Bart Kubis, in addition to Patrick Branch, who will function crew captain alongside Nadur.

“On the men’s side, we’ve got Bart (Kubis), who was the NCAA individual qualifier last year, so we’re hoping for some big things from him… Patrick Branch is one of our captains this year and he’s really versatile. He’s kind of the same as Joe and we’re hoping he can really step up in the sprints and help out on the relays a little bit more than he did last year.” 

Both Kubis and Branch are achieved swimmers, with Kubis having OAC titles within the 200 and 400 Medley Relays, and Branch having OAC titles within the 800 and 200 Freestyle Relays.

On the ladies’s facet, de Swardt highlights senior Olivia Goodman and sophomore Ella Muzychak, as returners to look at, in addition to 2025 captains Hannah Smith and Kaitlyn Hilty.

“On the women’s side, we’ve got Olivia Goodman. She’s been really good over the years, and she’s going to be a senior, so she’ll be great.”

Goodman has racked up a formidable array of accolades in her collegiate profession, together with OAC Swimmer of the Year in 2024, and three OAC Swimmer of the Week honors. In 2025, she was an OAC champion within the 400 IM, 200 Breaststroke, 400 Medley Relay, and 200 Medley Relay. 

“Ella Muzychak, she’s the distance girl on our team, and she’s been working really hard through the summer, so I’m expecting some big things from her.”

Coach de Swardt has lofty expectations, and justifiably so. In simply her freshman season, Muzychak was topped an OAC champion within the 800 Freestyle Relay.

In addition to returning expertise, each squads have some new faces within the constructing that Coach de Swardt expects to make an impression early.

“We’ve got Alex Gallagher who transferred in from Kentucky and he’s been going off in practice already. So we’re hoping that he’ll make a big impact. Another freshman that’s coming in, Jacob Florio, he’s made an instant impact, so he’s going to be amazing.

“And then on the ladies’s facet, Cami Kantakus has been excellent in follow to this point, so we’re anticipating some large issues from her.”

De Swardt added that depth in follow is up a substantial quantity, and total pleasure in this system is mounting because the squads are able to chase their objectives within the 2025 season. 

Both the lads and the ladies will head to Gambier, Ohio on Saturday, October 18, to tackle the Kenyon Owls of their season openers.