LONG BEACH, Calif. - The UC San Diego men's and women's swimming teams, hosts of this week's Toshiba Classic held at the Belmont Plaza Olympic Pool, closed out the three-day event with more stellar racing across the board Saturday.
The UCSD men finished fourth of 14 squads with 675 points, trailing only Stanford, Hawaii and Air Force Academy. The Triton women, in a larger field of 26 teams, finished seventh with 363 points after Stanford, California and UCLA took first, second and third respectively.
"The event as a whole went really well," UCSD head coach Scott McGihon said. "It was great to see the nation's fastest times set here at the meet and our squad was definitely in the mix there all three days."
On the men's side Saturday, Juan Pablo Carrillo recorded a personal best in the 200 breaststroke at 2:03.23, a fifth-place finish. In the 100 free, Todd Langland and Daniel Perdew placed eighth and 10th respectively with top times of 44.87 and 45.06. In the 1,650 freestyle distance event Saturday, senior Jereme Barnett-Woods put together another solid performance as he placed 11th with a time of 15:56.42.
Freshman Shaun Stringer eclipsed the NCAA Division II National Championships qualifying "A" standard Saturday in the 200 butterfly, crossing the line in the prelims at 1:52.25.
The top finish for the Triton men Saturday was the 400 free relay, in which Julius Espiritu, Todd Langland, Blake Langland and Perdew took second-place behind Hawaii with a time of 3:02.39.
For the UCSD women, Beth Dong recorded a stellar 17:13.14 time in the 1,650 free, placing 15th. In the 200 back, Alex Henley continued her strong week of racing with a ninth-place finish at 2:00.52. The 400 free relay team of Henley, Shea Kopp, Anju Shimura and Katherine Tse crossed the line in 3:29.23 to take 11th place.
Carianne Cunningham finished as the top UCSD swimmer in the 200 breaststroke, finishing 14th with a 2:21.39 mark.
In 2008, the UCSD men finished fifth at 456 points while the women placed fourth overall with 817 points out of a smaller field of 18 squads.
The Tritons return to action on Jan. 2 with a home meet with Truman State beginning at 11 a.m.
Courtesy: UCSD