March 5, 2004
LONG BEACH, Calif. - Arizona State senior All-American Nick Brunelli turned in an outstanding performance Friday night to win the 200 freestyle at the 2004 Pac-10 Men's Swimming Championships. Brunelli's time of 1:35.26 is a career-best and is the men's first conference swimming title since 2000. The Sun Devils as a team stand in 5th place with 270 points with one day of competition remaining.
With the third-fastest time in school history, Brunelli won his first conference crown by over a half-a-second with Stanford's Jayme Cramer touching the wall in 1:35.81. Brunelli was in second-place at the final turn, but a swim of 24.20 in the final 50 yards brought him the win. The last individual conference win for a men's swimmer was Attila Czene's victory in the 200 IM in 2000.
The consolation final in the 200 was won by junior Jeff Barrett in a personal-best time of 1:36.89 to finish ninth overall. Sophomore All-American David Kolozar finished 13th in the event (1:39.12) with junior Evan Rahaeuser in 19th (1:39.89) and sophomore Tom Hickman in 20th (1:42.67).
In the 100 backstroke senior All-American Ahmed Hussein placed fifth with a time of 48.03 to climb three spots from last year when he finished eighth. Also competing in the 100 back was sophomore A.J. Blusiewicz who placed 19th (51.04).
Junior Emerson Ward placed eighth in the 100 breaststroke (54.92) after clocking a 54.58 in the morning prelims to record the second-fastest time in ASU history. Junior All-American Russell MacDonald placed 10th (55.54) with junior Joey Clements in 12th (55.88), sophomore Leonardo Martins in 15th (56.74) and freshman Pat Fleming in 18th (57.13).
In the 100 butterfly, ASU had sophomores Steve McDonald (49.29) and Brett Meconis (49.89) place 15th and 17 respectively. Senior All-American Wiley Wallace placed 19th (51.50) while junior Kyle Horton finished in 21st (51.96).
In the 400 IM, senior Jon Shaw placed 17th with a time of 3:59.99. The last event of the day was the 400 medley relay of Hussein, Ward, McDonald and Brunelli, who clocked the fourth-fastest time in ASU history (3:14.45).
Standings after day three are as follows: 1 Stanford 563.5 2 California 506 3 Arizona 371.5 4 USC 339 5 Arizona State 270 6 Washington 206