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Show The Daily Utah Friday, March 12,1999 Swimmers Take Fourth At Men's WAC Tournament U ing in 1:37.45. His finals time of 1:38.96 was still good enough to garner a qualifying time. Robert Renna turned in an excellent performance in the 1650 yard free. His time of 15:34.01 placed him second overall and, The University of Utah men's like his teammates, got him a time. swimming team recently competed in the WAC Swimming and The next event good to Utah Diving Championship, held in was the 100 free. Federal Way, Wash. Nystrom and Johnson placed An inspired Ute performance third and fourth, respectively. saw the team finish in fourth Nystrom finished in 44.31 and with Johnson came in just 0.02 secThe 448.50 place points. Utes trailed only SMU, BYU and onds later. Both swimmers got Hawaii. time. yet another The last swimming event in Sophomore Troy Johnson got the Utes on the board with a which Utah had a notable finish fourth-plac- e finish in the 50 was the 400 freestyle relay. The took second place Utah freestyle. His final time of 20.29 seconds in a time of 2:58.54. Incidentally, was an NCAA qualifying qualifying that was a time. Consequently, he will await time. . Finally, in the diving competithe NCAA's ruling on whether or not he will qualify for national tion, sophomore Nick Smith had Utah's lone notable performance competition. Mike Greene, a junior, had a among the different events. He stellar performance in the 100 won the competition with a total score of 499.75. butterfly. In the meantime, while the He won the preliminary round with a time of 47.69 seconds. In swimmers await ruling from the the finals, he tied for second in NCAA regarding national quali48.52 just 0.02 seconds out of fication, the divers will move onto zone competition in Tempe, first. Ariz. a also like had He, Johnson, Smith and teammates Crystal time. qualifying was Gregory and Erica Fleming will Junior Johan Nystrom Utah's next standout swimmer,, begin competition today and placing fourth in the 200 free. He conclude on Saturday. Eric Walden dominated the prelims finish Chronicle Sportswriter ' will spend the first few days of spring break in Cedar City for three games against Southern Utah versity. The now 0 Utes dropped all three games against San Diego last Uni-Aft- a disappointing conference opening series at San Diego State last week, the Utah baseball team er 10-1- 4 I jSj m . J I V r' , .,, w , Erik Martinez Chronicle Asst. Sports Editor The Utah gymnastics team proved itself a road warrior in its last away meet two weeks ago, posting its highest score of the year (197.625), at Utah State. nt to the test over the next two weekends as the team heads to No. 13 Oregon State on Sunday (2 p.m.), followed by a meet at New Hampshire the following weekend (March 20). The No. 3 Red Rocks have yet to lose a meet this season, with a 10-- 0 record (5-- 0 neutral) going home, 0 away, into these two road trips. After the outstanding meet at Utah State, the Red Rocks withstood a potenmeet last week at home, tial second its highest total of the scoring year (197.150) in its win over Washington. "We need to continue to build and between now and not have a the postseason," said Utah coach Greg Marsden. "We need to improve the little things and gain some more confidence. We'd like to still upgrade a couple of vaults, but on the other events we're doing pretty much what we'll be doing for the rest of the year." The Red Rocks have been doing very little wrong as of late, as their last four opponents can attest. of 193.625 on Since Utah's season-loits oppoof none Feb. 12 at Arizona, close to come have nents beating the Red Rocks. Once Utah returned from its meet with the Wildcats, the Utes went on a tear, ripping up their next four meets with scores of 196.375 against LSU, 196.975 against Florida, 197.625 at Utah State and most recently 197.150 against Washington. Oregon State appears to be the toughest team remaining on the Red Rocks' schedule this year, and may in 4-- -0 let-do- let-do- w 7T rv , t " ,rw ' .' stay unbeaten on the year as the Red Rocks travel for a meet against No. :.' 13 Oregon State. fact be the only obstacle standing in the way of an undefeated season for Utah. Although Utah's average per meet (196.6375) is over two points higher than the Beavers' average (194.4500), an Oregon State win is by no means out of the question on Sunday afternoon. The 5 Beavers posted a season-hig- h 195.60 against Washington, and just last Friday, OSU defeated No. 6 Michigan State in the Shanico Invitational. "Oregon State is always a tough place to compete," said Marsden. "They have a great following in Corvallis and their team is always good, especially at home." It is anyone's guess what the Red Rocks' line-u- p will look like on Sunday, while Marsden and the team continue fine tuning all four line-up- s. One thing is certain the unfortunate fact that Theresa Wolf will be out completely for the third straight meet. Wolf, a sophomore injured her knee in practice on March 1, sidelining her last week and at least this week as well. Prior to the knee injury, Wolf sat out the Utah State meet because of a back 7-- The Red Rocks warriors will be put Utah will try to weekend, but they should be able to pick up some wins against the Thunderbirds this week. SUU is a Division two school, and they play out of the Conference, so the three games won't mean much in terms of earning a WAC tournament spot. But the Utes have a chance to correct some problems and get in some good practice. At the plate, Utah has been doing quite well. Senior Ryan Johnerson is batting 0.353 ar)d leads the team with 30 hits. Johnerson has hit six homcruns and has 21 RBI on the season, and is a perfect eight stolen bases in eight attempts. Freshman Adam Castlcton has earned himself a spot in the starting lineup by being one of three Utes (Eric Wallace is the third) who is batting over 0.300 this season. Unfortunately for Utah, the Utes have faced teams who swing the bat just as well, and Utah's pitching staff has paid the price. San Diego batters got 35 hits in three games off Utah pitching. Junior Brandon Paige leads the Utes with a 2.57 ERA, but they run up to Lance Ericksen's 6.23. This weekend should be a bit of a break for Utah's pitchers. this The Thunderbirds are season. They dropped four of five games to Utah last year. Utah plays the first game of the series this afternoon at and then, after a wild night in Cedar City, the Utes play a double header Saturday at noon. Utah returns to WAC competition next weekend with its first home series against Rice. Unbeaten Red Rocks Road Trip for Oregon State Meet O -- Xi-. 11 6-- Utah's pitchers look for relief against Southern Utah. V -- Baseball Breaking Even Sterling Clifford Nick Smith Wins 7 -- Meter Diying Event Chronicle injury. Prior to Wolf's bangs and bruises, she had posted a career high score of 39.225 on Feb. 19 against LSU. Wolf's presence in vault may be missed the most by Utah, as she maintains in the event, with a Utah's season-hig- h 9.925. Judging by Utah's scores last week, the Red Rocks don't mind plunging into their deep roster one bit. Shannon Bowles won both the vault and the beam against the Huskies last week, while Utah tallied its highest team floor score of the year (49.525). This score was Utah's second highest team score on any rotation this year. The floor score was aided largely by three straight scores of 9.950, turned in by Theresa Kulikowski, Angie Leonard and Deidra Graham. |