The No. 1 Arizona men’s swim team came up short in a very competitive Pacific 10 Conference championship meet. Stanford took first (865 points) to extend its streak of conference titles to 27, with California (769) finishing second and Arizona (748.5) third.
The Wildcats couldn’t hold on to win the conference championship after being in first place through the first day of competition, but UA head swim coach Frank Busch still called the meet a success.
“”It was a really, really good meet for us,”” Busch said. “”We’ve been murdered at that meet for many, many years but we’re just so much deeper and such a better team now. Other teams were ready to go at that meet, and we’ll be ready to go in three weeks (for the NCAA championships).””
The Wildcats beat both California and Stanford during their regular season dual meets in the Bay Area.
Arizona ended the meet with an emphatic victory in the 400-yard freestyle relay – a win that Busch said put an exclamation point on their accomplishments.
Six difference Wildcat swimmers posted automatic qualifying times for the March 27 NCAA championships in Seattle – freshman Cory Chitwood (200y backstroke), sophomores Jean Basson (200y freestyle, 500y freestyle) and Joel Greenshields (100y freestyle), junior Nicolas Nilo (100y freestyle, 200y freestyle) and seniors Albert Subirats (100y backstroke, 100y butterfly) and Darian Townsend (100y freestyle, 200y freestyle, 200y individual medley) – as well as the 200y freestyle, 200y medley, 400y freestyle and 800y freestyle relay teams.
Townsend was the top performer for the Wildcats as he won the 200y individual medley and 200y freestyle events and was a part of the first place 400y freestyle relay and 800y freestyle relay teams. Busch expects Townsend to swim even faster when the NCAA’s roll around because his body wasn’t shaved, but he was still able to post a fast time.
“”Stanford is still very deep, but I’m looking forward to us getting the quickest times we can (when we’re tapered) and we could win some events,”” Townsend said. “”We’ve done all of the work we can do, now we just rest for NCAA’s.””
