Hubert Kos’ Marchand Moments Instrumental to Texas Title
Hubert Kos’ comparison of the 2025 NCAA Championships with the 2024 edition quickly tracks to the individual.
“What stands out about this one,” Kos said, still dripping from his fully clothed dip in the diving well at the Weyerhauser King County Aquatic Center Saturday night, “is that I actually swam well.”
Kos can be a harsh self-critic, and by the Hungarian Olympian’s standards, the 2024 NCAA Championships didn’t personally measure up. Yes, as a sophomore at Arizona State, he’d celebrated a momentous first title for the Sun Devils in which he made three individual and two relay finals. But Kos didn’t leave Indianapolis feeling like he’d swum to his standards.
Saturday, there was no such doubt. After watching ASU teammate Leon Marchand dominate the competition in 2024, Kos played the Marchand role as a junior, leading Texas back to the summit for its 16th national championship.
“Last year I didn’t really swim that well, and we had Leon on to carry us,” Kos said. “But this year we didn’t have any Leon, so I knew that I had to step up and really do well in my events, and I was able to do that. So I’m really, really happy.”
Marchand is the most reasonable recent comparison for what Kos accomplished in Federal Way. He won the 200 individual medley in a sensational race with Cal’s Destin Lasco, going 1:37.91, equal to Lasco’s American record set in 2024 and .07 ahead of the Cal fifth-year. Only Marchand’s past brilliance prevented Kos from chalking up another NCAA mark. In the 100 back, Kos went 43.20 to edge Florida’s Jonny Marshall by .02 seconds and take down the NCAA record.
The 200 back was start-to-finish dominance, Kos going 1:34.21 to lop more than a second off the mark and to beat the field by 2.2 seconds. The chasers were headed by Lasco, in pursuit of his fourth consecutive NCAA crown in the event.
“That was a crazy, crazy finish to a really crazy meet,” Kos said. “I knew that I had a chance to do something special in that event. Obviously, I wanted to go 33, but it’s fine, maybe next year. And it was really a great feeling to get that second NCAA record.”
Hubert Kos; Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick
Kos also swam fly on Texas’ winning 200 medley relay and its runner-up 400 medley relay.
Kos’ 2024 NCAAs doesn’t seem all that bad in retrospect, but it didn’t meet his expectations. He finished second in the 200 back, fourth in the 100 back and third in the 200 IM. But all of the times were slower than at the final Pac-12 Championships a month earlier, the 200 IM nearly nine tenths slower. Kos was also part of the Sun Devils’ 800 free relay that finished second and the winning 400 medley relay, though Kos’ opening split in backstroke was only sixth-fastest in the field.
Bob Bowman, Kos’ coach then and now, takes the blame for that. He had Kos shave and rest for Pac-12s, apprehensive to see a performance out of him in short-course yards, where the native of Telki was still finding his feet. He performed well at Pac-12s, but as is common, didn’t bounce back for NCAAs.
This year, the focus was exclusively on NCAAs, and the results were nothing short of spectacular.
Hubert Kos is also a different swimmer. He entered his sophomore season at ASU on the back of a world championship in the 200 back. He arrived in Austin an Olympic gold medalist in that event.
Those that know him well have seen a difference.
“He has experienced a lot more than I do, or any other swimmers basically in today’s NCAA, right now,” said fellow Hungarian Olympian Zalan Sarkany, the 1650 freestyle champ for Indiana who roomed with Kos at Arizona State and has known him since they were very young. “I would say almost as much as Leon now. But he just knows how to execute his races, and he’s a natural talent.”
“He’s much more confident,” Bowman said. “He used to get quite nervous at the meets and after the Olympics now, he’s just like, this is a piece of cake. So I think that has really helped him.”
Unprompted, Kos brought up the Olympic pedigree Saturday. There’s something about stepping into the 200 back knowing you’re the Olympic champion that heightens the desire to show everyone what you can do. Kos hasn’t felt extra pressure from that status. Instead, he views it as license to keep pushing to new levels.
“It’s completely different to being a world champion, obviously. But I don’t feel that I have more pressure on me because of it,” he said. “I just feel that I know now how to swim better, and obviously I have to get better every single year to keep up with these guys. So it’s really just a case of doing the work, really putting in all the work that we have, and trusting in the process, because that’s what gets us to the top.”
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Having watched Hubert Kos since when he first came to ASU two and 1/2 years ago, I have to agree he has greatly improved, epically in his turns.