Red-hot ASU swimming sets sights on Pac-12, NCAA Championships

Going into Pac-12 Championships, Bob Bowman has the Sun Devils humming.

The men’s squad is 9-0-1 and ranked No. 1 in the country.

The women’s team is ranked No. 21 and is coming off a Territorial Cup victory. 

“We’ve been doing pretty well and just focusing on each dual meet,” junior and five-time NCAA individual champion Léon Marchand said. “We won every single one except the one at Cal…Now I’ll focus on the next step which is Pac-12’s in two weeks and then NCAA in one month…We’ve been practicing this a lot, so should be good.”

Senior Lindsay Looney closed out the regular season winning all three events she swam at Arizona: the 100 fly, 200 fly and 400 free relay.

“My aerobic base has gotten really strong with Bob and kind of developing a really strong 500 [freestyle] even within just the past year,” Looney said. “It has been one of my really exciting, strong suits that I can take into Pac-12’s next week. Looking back to Freshman year…I feel like I was just this small little girl and I had so many different opportunities to look into I came in as a 400 IMer and a 200 IMer and 200 flier. We took that and changed directions a lot…I think that’s the beauty of college swimming and learning from your coach and having a really good way of communicating with your coach and knowing and trusting the process too.”

From Marchand to Michael Phelps, Bowman is no stranger to talent. Just like his swimmers, he’s had to adjust his process throughout the years.

“Coach Bowman has been to the Olympics seven times already, so I think he knows how to handle that,” Marchand said. “It’s all different this time because of course, we have another goal, which is the NCAA title…He’s very calm and he knows how to manage all of that. I just trust him, trust the process and trying to work harder and harder every day to get ready when I will be at NCAA’s or in Paris.”

“One of the challenges that I’ve learned is honestly what I need preparing for big competitions,” Looney said. “I need very little taper. We joke with each other even the other day. He was like, ‘Well, your taper is gonna be on the flight there.’…It opened my eyes to realize how well coaches have to know their athletes and develop different training plans…That’s something that I always have to trust and believe in him and know that he’s doing the right thing for me.”

“Like anybody in any sort of pursuit when you start out, you have relatively few tools in your toolbox,” Bowman said. “When I first got started, my only tool was a hammer. So everything looked like a nail, right? I made people do stuff all the time because that’s what good coaches did…I still do that sometimes, but in general, I’ve tried to add to my toolbox and try to learn more about communication and learn more about how different athletes take and what works best with each one and tailor the coaching to them.”

As Marchand eyes Sun Devil history (Two NCAA individual titles away from tying Jackie Johnson with seven) and the 2024 Paris Olympics for his home country of France, his success is a nod to his continuous growth over the years.

“Try to improve my walls, my breakouts,” Marchand said. “When I touched the wall for the 400 IM at World’s, I also thought about what can I improve? I know my coach did the same, and we know what can be better…Keep improving on some strokes and trying to find a better way to swim it too…I wanna say it’s the year when I’m having the most fun because there are many different goals and many different challenges. That’s what I love.”

“[Marchand] was pretty independent when he came, but each successive year it’s been fun to see him grow as a man, as an athlete and he’s very serious about swimming,” Bowman said. “He’s learned how to manage the things away from the pool that everyone has to do when you go to college…He’s really had just sort of a natural progression, very much like the other guys on the team.”

Coming off the program’ first-ever Pac-12 championship, ASU Men’s swimming is looking to go back-to-back.

Women’s Pac-12 title meet will get going on February 28 and the men will start on March 6.