The Fittin children have always intended to swim together. Younger siblings Peter and Carolyn followed older sister Annie Fittin to Maryland.
But Annie is now graduated, and the Maryland swimming program is on the rocks. Penn State has already announced that Peter will be transferring there next year, and the family theme will continue as Carolyn will head to Penn State as well.
In true Fittin fashion, she's a great sprint freestyler, with bests of 22.8 and 49.67 in the 50 and 100 freestyles, respectively, with a 22.44 on an All-American 200 free relay from last year's NCAA Championships.
She, however, brings perhaps the best versatility of the three siblings. Even as just a freshman, she also has bests of 1:49.37 in the 200 free, and a 54.11 in the 100 fly. And if she follows the pattern of older sister Annie, it would imply that she still has a lot of development to go. Annie, for example, was only going 23′s as a sophomore, and then by the time she was a senior was an ACC Champion in the 50 free.
Penn State graduated a huge portion of their sprint group, so this addition becomes especially valuable to them. Paige Whitmire (49.31 flat-start) is the only returning sub-50 second 100 freestyler on next year's squad.
But with Fittin coming in and joining these relays for the next three years, the graduations will be cushioned greatly. As their number-two swimmer in the 50-100-200 freestyles, as well as the 100 fly, she will likely wind up on a number of the Nittany Lions' top relays as they try to improve-upon their 5th place finish from last year's Big Ten Championships. The Big Ten is without a true superpower at the top, but is very deep and has a lot of parity, so even one signing of this caliber can lead to big moves for a program.
The Fittins, from the Peddie School in New Jersey, fit right in at Penn State, which has a huge New Jersey influence. Next year, there will be over 10 New Jersey natives in the pool for the men's and women's programs.