USC begins Pac-12 championships


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Senior Katinka Hosszu broke a school record in the 200-yard free in a lead-off swim of USC’s third-place 800-yard to highlight the Women of Troy’s first night at the 2012 Pac-12 swimming and diving championships in Federal Way, Wash., on Wednesday.

Final push · The Women of Troy are currently tied for third place at the conference championships. The meet will continue until Saturday. - Anna Wierzbowska | Daily Trojan

USC finished third in a three-way tie with Arizona and Arizona State with 104 points for the first night, which consisted of just two relays. California is currently first (128 points), while Stanford is in second (112). The three-way tie is followed up by UCLA (96), Oregon State (90), Utah (88) and Washington State (86).

USC’s 800-yard free relay quartet of Hosszu, junior Haley Anderson, senior Amanda Smith and sophomore Lynette Lim took third in 7:01.76, behind California’s first-place time of 6:57.86 and Stanford’s 6:58.82. USC’s time was a season-best and NCAA “A” cut, and fell just short of the 2010 school record of 6:59.48.

Hosszu led off the relay with a 1:43.19, cutting almost a full second off of her school record of 1:44.01 over 200 yards.

USC’s 200-yard medley relay took fifth as the foursome of junior Yumi So, sophomore Kasey Carlson, junior Christel Simms and Hosszu finished the tight race in 1:37.77. California’s relay team won with 1:36.77.

The championships continue through Saturday with prelims beginning at 11 a.m. and finals starting at 6 p.m.