March 6, 2004
LONG BEACH, Calif. - The Arizona State men's swimming and diving team finished the 2004 Pac-10 Championships in 5th place with 407 points as competition wrapped up Saturday night at the Belmont Plaza Olympic Pool. Following his win yesterday in the 200 freestyle, senior All-American Nick Brunelli finished second in the 100 freestyle to wrap up his final conference meet in successful fashion.
Brunelli's time of 43.12 is good for automatic NCAA qualification and is his fastest of the year. California's Duje Draganja won the event with a Pac-10 meet record time of 41.96. Junior Jeff Barrett finished 15th overall with a time of 44.79 in the consolation final while the Sun Devils had freshman Rich Crowder (19th, 45.77), senior All-American Wiley Wallace (20th, 45.78), freshman Pat Fleming (21st, 46.04) and sophomore Tom Hickman (23rd, 46.78) all place in the bonus consolation final.
Sophomore All-American David Kolozar earned a fourth-place finish in the 200 butterfly with a season-best time of 1:45.75. Sophomore Steve McDonald clocked a 1:48.95 to place 10th while sophomore Brett Meconis placed 14th (1:51.84) and senior Jonathan Shaw placed 15th (1:52.01).
In the 200 backstroke, senior All-American Ahmed Hussein finished seventh with a time of 1:46.38. The consolation finals featured junior Evan Rahaeuser in 11th (1:48.36) and sophomore A.J. Blusiewicz in 14th (1:50.93) while the bonus consolation final saw Sun Devil junior Kyle Horton place 18th (1:53.22).
Sophomore Leonardo Martins set a career-best in the 200 breaststroke, clocking a 1:59.48 to place 10th and record the third-fastest time in school history. Junior Joey Clements placed 13th (2:00.48) after setting a lifetime-best in the morning prelims with a time of 1:59.66 to place himself fourth on the all-time ASU list. Junior All-American Russell MacDonald finished 16th after touching the wall in 2:04.55.
In the final event of the meet, the Sun Devil foursome of Brunelli (43.45), Barrett (44.60), Wallace (45.34) and Hussein (45.31) placed fifth in the 400 freestyle relay with a time of 2:58.70.
The men's divers compete next in the NCAA Zone E Diving Championships March 11-13, in Oklahoma City. Qualified men's swimmers and divers will then travel to the NCAA Championships March 25-27, in East Meadow, N.Y. 2004 Pac-10 Men's Swimming and Diving Championships, Final Standings 1 Stanford 866.5 2 California 773 3 Arizona 522.5 4 USC 505 5 Arizona State 407 6 Washington 299