Austin, Texas ¨C After one day of competition at the NCAA Championships the #13 Penn State women¡¯s swim team is in 13th place with 32 points. Auburn leads the Championships with a score of 153, while defending champion Georgia is in second with 127 points.

After setting a school record in the 500-yard freestyle in the preliminaries, Sally Anderson (Somerset, N.J.) nearly duplicated that feat again in the consolation finals. Anderson used a strong second half of the race to swim a time of 4:46.17, which was less than 0.5 seconds away from the record she set in the prelims. She finished 5th in the consolation heat, earning her 13th overall.

Penn State began the night with 200-yard freestyle relay. The Nittany Lions came into the consolation final seeded 10th and ended up with the same overall finish. The team of Deirdre Dlugonski (Washington, Pa.), Piper Chamberlin (Grand Junction, Colo.), Kristin Weinhold (Durham, N.C.), and Katie Hostetler (Chambersburg, Pa.) finished in a time of 1:31.62.

In the final event of the day, the 400-yard medley relay, Penn State placed 10th in a time of 3:40.41. Katie Bruzda (Latrobe, Pa.), Kristen Woodring (Sinking Spring, Pa.), Corrie Clark (Malvern, Pa.) and Deirdre Dlugonski combined to finish second in the consolation heat, which earned them their overall placing of 10th.

In other meet highlights, five NCAA and American records were broken on the first day of competition. Georgia¡¯s Maritza Correia broke Olympian Amy Van Dyken¡¯s NCAA and American record in the 50-yard freestyle. Correia swam a time of 21.69, which broke Dyken¡¯s record 21.77 set in 1994. Georgia¡¯s 200 free relay team set a new NCAA and American record en route to victory with a time of 1:28.74, which broke the old record of 1:28.89 set by Texas last year. Junior Maggie Bowen of Auburn broke her own NCAA and American record en route to winning the 200-yard individual medley in a time of 1:53.91. She broke her old record of 1:55.49 set last year.

In the final event of the night, Stanford set a new NCAA and American record in the 400-yard medley relay with a time of 3:31.74. California¡¯s Natalie Coughlin set a new NCAA and American record in the 100-yard backstroke as the leadoff leg for the 400 medley relay.

Tomorrow¡¯s preliminaries will begin at 11:00 a.m. (12:00 ET). The finals rounds will begin at 7:00 p.m. (8:00 ET).

Penn State quotes:

Head Coach Bill Dorenkott

On performance of first day:
When you look back, I am pleased we came back and raced well. Sally Nderson put in back to back great races considerably faster than her lifetime bests. The 200 free and 400 medley were the highest we have ever scored at NCAA¡¯s. Kristin Weinhold put together several nice splits and Corrie Clark smoked a split in the 100 butterfly. Her [Clark¡¯s] split was the fastest in school history [52.79].

On the next two days:
The key is to compete in the morning and come to race. I am looking forward to see what we can do. Relays are double points so we want to do well in those. Individually we have a chance to come back and do real well.

Assistant Coach John Retrum

On the today¡¯s competition and a looking ahead:
This was probably the weakest day of the three for us. We bettered a few of our times from the prelims, which is a good sign. Tomorrow is a big day and we need to step up our performance.

On the numerous NCAA and American records:
Some of those girls are amazing swimmers. It was exciting to watch and will be so for the next two days.

Corrie Clark

I was happy with my split in the 400 medley and hope to hit the same time in the open butterfly. I think we will swim and compete better tomorrow. We are all excited for the next few days.

For full Day 1 Results [in .doc format] click here.