Split squad no problem for USC

The USC swimming and diving team split up and competed in three different competitions over the weekend — the UCLA Diving Invite, the SMU Classic Invite and the California Grand Prix — with each group achieving successful results.

USC’s diving team competed at the UCLA Diving Invite on Saturday where sophomore Harrison Jones won the 1-meter with 323.30 points and the platform with 364.05 points. Freshman Ariel Rittenhouse won the 3-meter springboard with 342.40 points and junior Christine Petrilli was the highest scoring woman of Troy on platform, coming in fourth with 216.15 points.

In Dallas, eight of USC’s fastest men swam at the SMU Classic Invite on Friday and Saturday against some of the nation’s top teams including Florida, Michigan and SwimMAC. USC’s two biggest victories were in the 200-yard freestyle and 800-yard freestyle relays.

The sprint freestyle relay featured senior Zoltan Povazsay, freshman Clement Lefert and sophomores Jeff Daniels and Pat White. The men won in a time of 1:21.05, beating the national record holding team, SwimMAC.

The 800-yard relay included junior Richard Charlesworth, Lefert, White and Povazsay, winning with a time of 6:30.54.

“The fact that we beat both Florida and Michigan, which are top eight NCAA teams, was significant to our improvement as a team,” coach Dave Salo said.

Salo considered Lefert’s victory in the 200-yard butterfly the best individual performance of the meet. The Frenchman scored a season best time and improved on his NCAA consideration ‘B’ time with a 1:44.28. Povazsay came second in the 500-yard freestyle (4:23.63), and Charlesworth clocked his first NCAA ‘B’ cut as a Trojan (4:24.89).

USC came 5th overall scoring 260 points.

Meanwhile, the rest of the USC swim team was racing hard at the California Grand Prix in Long Beach, Calif. on Friday and Saturday.

Junior Presley Bard, a transfer from Indiana, further established herself as one of USC’s top female competitors and came 5th in both the 100-yard freestyle (49.44) and the 200-yard backstroke (1:56.75). Both of these times were season bests for Bard and scored her two NCAA consideration “B” cuts.

USC’s female flyers dominated in the 200-yard butterfly final with sophomore Katinka Hosszu taking first with a 1:53.99, junior Lyndsay DePaul touching second in a 1:55.45, freshman Yumi So coming in fourth (1:58.88) and sophomore Tanya Krisman taking seventh place (2:01.52).

Freshman distance star Haley Anderson was third in the 500-yard freestyle, clocking a 4:45.05.

“We are looking forward to having a great Pac-10 meet and a much improved NCAA team performance in March,” Salo said.