Swimming Hosts Ranked Gophers, Razorbacks
1/13/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Swimming and Diving, Swimming & Diving
Jan. 13, 2010
COLUMBIA, Mo. -
The Missouri Swimming and Diving teams face one of the toughest tests of the new season, as the men's swimming and diving group face off with eighth-ranked Minnesota, while the 25th ranked women tackle 18th ranked Arkansas this Saturday at the Mizzou Aquatics Center. The men are returning to action after defeating Division II Missouri S&T last weekend in Columbia, as the women are competing for the first time in 2010 after training the past two weeks. Last Time Out With nine victories Saturday afternoon in their first meet of the new year, the Missouri men's swimming and diving team defeated Missouri S&T 154-103 at the Mizzou Aquatics Center. In the 100 back, Jan Konarzewski won clocking in at 49.73 seconds, with Ryan Sellers coming in second in 50.90 seconds and John Higgins in third in 52.06 seconds. Konarzewski then took the 200 back event, claiming the top spot in 1:50.32, with Higgins finishing second in 1:53.64. Jordan Hawley and Anders Melin finished in the one-two in the 50 free event, with Hawley edging out Melin by .28 seconds, 21.09 to 21.37 seconds. Hawley won his second individual race of the day in the 100 free, clocking in at 46.57 seconds, just ahead of Cameron Sellers, who finished second in 47.82 seconds. It's also a return home of sorts for assistant coach Bill Tramel, a Missouri graduate who swam and was an assistant coach for two years. The Meet Minnesota comes in as a top ten team in the nation in men's Division I, and it shows with 20 swimmers already having "B" cut times this year. Led by Curt Carlson, Michael Richards and Alex Wold, the Golden Gophers have at least one swimmer in the top 30 times in most racing events. Minnesota is coming off a 142-111 dual victory against Hawaii in Honolulu, where Carlson won four races, three individual and one relay last week. The Golden Gopher program as a whole has been a model of success in the Big Ten, winning five conference championships in the 2000's. Arkansas heads to Mizzou after a tilt with North Texas, as the women's squad defeated the Mean Green 192-106 in Fayetteville last weekend. The Razorbacks are 5-1 in dual meets this year, and finished third at the Purdue Invitational, where 16 Arkansas swimmers made provisional times for the NCAA Meet later this year. Where the Razorbacks look to shine is in the longer free races with Jamie Marks leading the pack, and in the 100 and 200 breast races, led by Yi-Ting Siow and Leah Pierce. Siow currently has the best time in the country this year in the 200 breast and a top-20 time nationally in the 200 and 400 IM. The event will begin at 11 a.m. with live stats of the meet available through MUTigers.com.
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