Swimming and Diving Enjoys Several Season Bests at Texas Invite

Dec. 9, 2002

AUSTIN, Texas - Swimmer Jessica Blake and diver Azul Almazan each recorded third-place finishes to lead the University of Houston swimming and diving team Saturday during the final day of the Texas Invitational.

Diving from the platform for the first time all season, Almazan racked up 399.70 points to finish third in that event. The Mexico City, Mexico, native set a new UH 9-dive record on the platform with her total.

Blake swam the 200-yard backstroke in a time of 2:08.58 to finish third as well but was less than half a second behind the second-place competitor.

In the team competition, the Cougars finished with 93 points to stand in ninth place, ahead of Conference USA rival TCU, Hawaii, Northwestern and Florida. Host Texas took top honors with 856 points, with Wisconsin, USC, Arizona, Arizona State, UC Santa Barbara, Rice and Nebraska rounding out the top eight team leaders.

Despite the low finish, it was a successful weekend for the Cougar Swimming and Diving program which saw six swimmers post season-best times in 10 different events. In addition, five relay teams recorded UH season-best times during the three-day meet.

Freshman Stacey Williams recorded season-best times in the 100-yard freestyle, 200-yard freestyle and 200-yard butterfly, while Falon Hopkins set new Cougar bests 100-yard butterfly, 100-yard backstroke and 50-yard freestyle.

Junior Lucile Turpin posted a time of 4:30.14 in the 400-yard individual medley, the ninth fastest time in school history in that event.

Other Cougars who set season bests were Jessica DeWitt (50-yard backstroke) and Tatjana Banjeglav (100-yard breaststroke).

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