FEDERAL WAY, Wash. – No. 1 Stanford got underway at the Pac-12 Swimming Championships on Wednesday night at the King County Aquatic Center.
"I thought we started off the meet with two really good swims," said Goldman Family Director of Men's Swimming Ted Knapp. "Both relays posted faster times than fully-shaved squads in December, and it was great to see Ben Ho pick up an NCAA cut in the 200 back."
Stanford's 200-yard medley relay team of Ryan Dudzinski, Matt Anderson, Andrew Liang and Sam Perry (1:24.73) placed fourth to start the meet. In the 800-yard freestyle relay, Stanford's quartet of Abrahm DeVine, Liam Egan, James Murphy and Grant Shoults (6:17.98) finished third. Sophomore Ho (1:41.13) also swam an NCAA cut in a time trial for the 200-yard backstroke, likely punching his ticket to the NCAA Championships.
The Cardinal's 156 points, which includes totals from last week's Pac-12 Diving Championships, sits in third place behind first-place USC (177) and Cal (162).
No. 1 Stanford returns to action tomorrow with preliminary swims starting at 11 a.m. PT. Events include the 500-yard freestyle, 200-yard individual medley and 50-yard freestyle. The evening session will also include the 200-yard freestyle relay.
Grant Shoults owned the fastest 500 free time in the nation for the regular season, and Stanford owns four of the fastest seven times in the Pac-12. Abrahm DeVine enters the 200 IM with the conference's fastest time, with Brennan Pastorek, Alex Liang and Ben Ho each ranking top-10. Sam Perry and Alberto Mestre represent Stanford's fastest sprinters on the psych sheet – two years ago, Perry won both the 50 and 100-yard freestyle titles.
Live streaming and results will be available at GoStanford.com, and updates will be provided on Twitter at @StanfordMSwim.
