Mountain West Conference Swimming and Diving Championships To Be Held in Oklahoma City

TheMWC.com

WEB

Mountain West Conference Swimming and Diving Championships To Be Held in Oklahoma City

Oklahoma City Community College is the host site for the championships for the second year.

Swimming & Diving Home

HEADLINES

MWC Announces Swimmers and Divers of the Week

• Email this to a friend

Feb. 9, 2001

Colorado Springs, Colo. - The Mountain West Conference descends upon Oklahoma City, Okla., to host the 2001 Swimming and Diving Championships February 14-17.

Oklahoma City Community College is the host site for the championships for the second year. Oklahoma City welcomes back the defending men's and women's conference champions from Brigham Young University. Currently the BYU men are ranked No. 15 in the nation.

The eight Mountain West Conference member schools, Air Force, BYU, Colorado State, New Mexico, San Diego State, UNLV, Utah and Wyoming, begin competition Wednesday, Feb. 14 at 10 a.m. with the preliminary round of the men's 1-meter springboard competition. Swimming action gets underway at 6 p.m. with the 200-yard free and medley relays.

A handful of Mountain West Conference student-athletes will be returning to their home state of Oklahoma to compete. UNLV junior David Schick, from Tulsa, was the winner of the 100-yard fly and the 200-yard individual medley at last year's championships. He is currently ranked fourth in the conference in the 100-yard backstroke with a time of 51.68. He also was one of the three UNLV swimmers to compete in the U.S. Olympic Trials this past summer in the 100-meter butterfly.

Colorado State sophomore Dylon Groenwold, of Jenks, holds the conference all-time record in the 200-yard breaststroke with a time of 2:11.41. Air Force freshman Rory Peterson, of Ponca City, appears on the MWC fastest times list in the 500-yard freestyle, the 1650-yard freestyle and the 400-yard individual this season.

New Mexico's Erin Smith, calls Oklahoma City home. The sophomore, who was Valedictorian at Westmoore High School, was named Academic All-Mountain West Conference last season and finished eighth in the 500-yard freestyle and 16th in the 200-yard freestyle at last year's championships. She also led Lobos last year with the fastest times in those events.

The Mountain West Conference is located in Colorado Springs, Colo., under the leadership of Commissioner Craig Thompson. In just its second year of operation the league has claimed a national championship in cross country, qualified over 22 teams for NCAA tournaments and had over 61 student-athletes earn All-America honors. Six men and three women earned NCAA All-America honors last year in swimming and diving.

Some other highlights from the conference in swimming and diving:

Mountain West Conference Men's Swimmer of the Year Jacint Simon from UNLV holds the school record in the 200, 500 and 100-yard freestyle and competed in the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney.

Mountain West Conference Women's Swimmer of the Year Lorena Diaconescu of UNLV holds the school record in the 100, 200 and 500-yard freestyle and competed in the 2000 Olympic Games.

Sydney Olympian Arunas Savikas of BYU holds five school records in the 100, 200 and 500-yard freestyle and the 100 and 200-yard backstroke.

The MWC 2001 Swimming and Diving Championships will feature six Olympians and three competitors in the U.S. Olympic Trials.

48 men and 88 women were named to the Mountain West Conference Academic team for having a GPA of 3.0 or above.

Any media inquiries can be made to Jamie Maddox , Swimming and Diving Contact in the MWC office or at (719) 339-1624 in Oklahoma City.