Lopes schedule revealed for final WAC season

The Grand Canyon swimming and diving team is set for the final year competing in the WAC before joining The Big West as an affiliate member in the 2025-26 season.

The first meet of the season will take place Oct. 4-5 at Seattle U. The Lopes have not been to the state of Washington since 2019. GCU has not dropped a dual to the Redhawks in 14 meetings. California Baptist also will be in attendance for the first of two duals this season with the second coming on Senior Day in Phoenix on Jan 18.

Less than a week after the Seattle meet, the Lopes will compete with the other top teams in Arizona on Oct. 12 in Tempe.

"The All-Arizona Division I meet at Arizona State will include ASU, Arizona and Northern Arizona in addition to us," Lopes head coach Steve Schaffer said. "It will be all nontraditional events to mix things up a bit and should be a great event."

After swimming with the best of State 48, GCU will head to the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Open Water Championship, which takes place in Long Beach, California. Last season, the GCU men and women each took second to claim the meet's overall win.

The whole team will head to Hawai'i on Oct. 25 in a dual meet with the Rainbow Warriors.

"The meet with Hawai'i is a new team for us and a first look at one of The Big West teams," Schaffer said.

On Nov. 1, GCU will host local programs Ottawa and Arizona Christian, as well as British Columbia-based Division II program Simon Fraser. The Red Leafs are the only Canadian university that operates in the NCAA. This competition will mark the first home competition of the season.

The last meet prior to the Midseason Invitational will take place against conference rival Air Force on Nov. 11.

The Lopes will return to the Purdue Midseason Invitational for the first time since the 2019 season.

"We upgraded the midseason invite and are going back to Purdue," Schaffer said. "This will be a stronger team than back then, so it will be interesting to see how we match up this time."

During the 2019-20 season, the GCU men placed fourth while the women took fifth.

GCU will return home for a meet with Ottawa and Arizona Christian on Dec. 7 before a dual with the reigning men's national champion, Arizona State, in Tempe on Jan. 4.

The Lopes will close the regular season out with a trip to Las Vegas to swim against UNLV on Feb. 1.

The women's team will also travel to New Mexico State (Jan. 11) and Northern Colorado (Feb. 8).

"We have dual meets with all of the top women's teams in the WAC and the only WAC team the men don't have a dual meet with is Wyoming, so we have a great mix of WAC competitions in our last season in the conference," Schaffer said.

The WAC Championships will return to Houston for the first time since the 2021-22 season.

The postseason will again include the CSCAA National Invitational Championships on March 13-15 in Ocala, Florida.

The Zone E Diving Championships (March 10-12) and the NCAA Championships for women (March 19-22) and men (March 26-29) will take place this year in Federal Way, Washington.

The full men's schedule can be viewed here, with the women's available here.

Grand Canyon University Athletics

Related Videos