On this day 29 years ago, Ann Marie Wycoff ’85 turned in an historic performance at the NCAA Division II National Swimming Championships.

The West Point senior repeated her performance from a year earlier, winning four individual National Championships in the 200 individual medley, 200 butterfly, 400 individual medley, and 1,650 freestyle while being named the meet’s Most Outstanding Swimmer for a second consecutive year. In the process, she set three Army records as well as the NCAA Division II record in the 400 IM (4:25.45) while almost single-handedly earning Army a 4th place finish despite having only eight athletes in the competition. In addition to those individual titles, Wycoff won the 400 IM at the 1987 NCAA Championships, becoming the first Academy woman to win an individual National title.

From Newsday:

Big Finish for LI Swimmer

In the NCAA Division II Swimming and Diving Championships in Buffalo, West Point’s Ann Marie Wycoff of Northport was voted Swimmer of the Meet after winning the 200 individual medley in 2:05.98, the 200 butterfly in 2:03.26, the 400 medley in 4:24.76 (breaking her own Division II record, set last year), and the 1,650 freestyle in 17:01.77. She finishes her four-year career with nine titles, the most ever by a Division II woman.

At the close of her career, her nine individual National Championships and 19 All-American nods made her the most decorated athlete in Academy history. She also finished as the winningest female swimmer in NCAA Division II history. In honor of her contributions to West Point athletics, she was given the Army Athletic Association Award for most valuable service to athletics during her Cadet career.

In 2004, her place in West Point lore was cemented when she was included into Army’s inaugural Hall of Fame class which included “Doc” Blanchard, famous for winning the Heisman Trophy in 1945. She was also inducted into the Suffolk Sports Hall of Fame in 1994 and the Stony Brook School Hall of Fame in 1997.

To this day, despite all of the advances in swimsuit hydrodynamics, she continues to hold four individual Army records and is on the Top 10 list for seven different events.

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