Kansas Swimming and Diving Travels to College Station for Big 12 Championships

Feb. 22, 2010

Meet Notes Get Acrobat Reader

LAWRENCE, Kan. –

After tallying a successful 9-4 record in the regular season, the Kansas swimming and diving team heads to College Station, Texas for the Big 12 Swimming and Diving Championships this week. The meet begins Wednesday afternoon at the Student Recreation Natatorium Center on the Texas A&M campus and continues into the weekend. Last year at the Championship, the Jayhawks came away with a fourth-place finish, set eight school records and recorded 17 new team season-best times.

Kansas closed out its regular season with seven straight wins, the most recent coming at Iowa State on Feb. 5 and 6. Freshman Monica Johannessen won the 50-yard freestyle event, junior captain Joy Bunting won the 300-yard IM, sophomore Shannon Garlie took the top spot in the 400-yard freestyle and junior Iuliia Kuzhil placed first in the 150-yard backstroke event.

Kuzhil, a junior from Cherkasy, Ukraine, broke two Robinson Natatorium Records this season. She recorded a time of 55.20 in the 100-yard backstroke to beat Kansas’ Katie Chapeau’s record of 55.87 in 1993. In addition, she recorded a time of 1.59.42 in the 200-yard backstroke to beat Texas A&M’s Emily Neal’s record of 2:00.72, set in 2008.

Johannessen participated in the Norwegian Junior Championships in November and won 10 medals in 10 events. The native of Haugesund, Norway also earned a spot on the Senior Norwegian National team through her performance in the Junior Championships.

Senior diver and captain Meghan Proehl broke two of her own career records this season on the one-meter and three-meter boards. On the one-meter, Proehl recorded a 299.97 mark, shattering her previous record of 290.10. On the three-meter dive, Proehl beat her previous record of 282.82 with a score of 298.35. In addition, Proehl received Big 12 diver of the week honors on both Jan. 27 and Oct. 28.

“We are very excited for the upcoming Big 12 Championships,” said head coach Clark Campbell. “This is what the team has been pointing to all year and it’s time to achieve our goals. The athletes are ready to swim fast and dive well.”

The Big 12 Conference boasts six teams, three of which are in the top 25. Texas comes into the meet ranked No. 3, Texas A&M is ranked No. 7 and Missouri is No. 21. Texas, Texas A&M and Nebraska stand as the only teams to ever win a Big 12 Championship.

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