ATLANTA – It was a week to remember for the upward-trending Golden Bears, who finished the 2026 NCAA Championships in fourth place Saturday at McAuley Aquatic Center in Atlanta, Georgia.
 
It came down to the final race of the season, and when the lights were at their brightest, the underclassmen-led California women's swimming & diving team rose to the occasion and earned its highest finish since it headed home with fourth-place hardware in 2021.
 
The fourth and final day of the meet began with the Golden Bears getting five finals qualifiers in the morning prelims, their most this week, to give them their best shot of climbing the final team standings. Cal ended Thursday in sixth place with 199 points trailing both Tennessee (240.5) and Michigan (228).
 
Sophomore Mia West and freshman Teagan O'Dell got the Bears off to the perfect start punching their tickets to the 200 IM final with West getting the top time in the field at 1:52.40. O'Dell followed that up by earning a spot in the 200 backstroke final with the fifth best time in Cal history at 1:49.51. Then the Bears' two resident French National Team members came up big with graduate student Lilou Ressencourt qualifying in the 200 butterfly to reach the first A final of her career in her last prelim swim and sophomore Mary-Ambre Moluh advancing in the 100 freestyle.
 
The final session of the season started with Cal's first two-Bear podium of the meet. O'Dell (1:52.76) finished second and West (1:52.96) took third in the 200 IM giving them two individual podium finishes each this week.
 
Moluh was next breaking Cal's 100 freestyle record with a time of 46.30 to take sixth place. The sophomore now has her name on four total Cal records including two relays. Her fellow countryman Ressencourt secured some invaluable points in the final race of her career taking eighth in the 200 fly with a time of 1:54.01.
 
With just one more event to go in the 2026 season, Cal trailed Tennessee 279.5-273 for fourth place. The clutch, underclassmen quartet of West, Moluh, O'Dell, and freshmen Claire Weinstein stepped to the blocks for the 400 freestyle relay and clocked a time of 3:07.47, the third fastest in Cal history, to take fourth place while the Volunteers finished in eighth.
 
Cal ended the meet with 303 points to Tennessee's 301.5.
 
The week was highlighted by five of the Bears' underclassmen earning 11 individual First Team All-America honors including a 500 freestyle National Championship by Weinstein last night. It was Cal's first individual title since 2019 and was one of three times Weinstein found the podium in the meet. In total the Bears reached six podiums, earned 21 All-America nods, and broke four program records.
 
This concludes a very promising season for a young Bears team that welcomed in the best recruiting class in the history of the sport this year and has more promising young talent joining it in the pool next season.