Dec. 3, 2008
COLUMBIA, S.C. – The South Carolina swimming and diving team will be a split squad this weekend for their final competitions before the holiday break. Coach McGee Moody and a select group of swimmers will travel to Atlanta for the U.S. Short Course National Championships while the Gamecock divers, along with coach Todd Sherritt, head to Columbus, Ohio, for the Ohio State Invitational. The swimming competition begins Thursday and runs through Saturday, while the diving invite runs Friday-Sunday.
The Gamecocks will take 15 swimmers to Short Course Nationals where they will square off against some of the top swimmers in the nation, including several Olympic medalists from the 2008 Beijing games. For the men, it will be Andrew Atzhorn, Kyle Cormier, James Crawford, Rory Grigull, Armin Hornikel, Chris Kelly, David Livsey, Steven Luckie and Nicholas Walkotten. On the women’s side, the Gamecocks will send Amanda Dunnigan, Lydia Hackert, Lindsey Olson, Megan Sparks, Claire Thompson and Christine Thompson.
On the first day of competition for the Carolina women, Claire Thompson, Christine Thompson and Lindsey Olson will compete in the women’s 500-yard freestyle, and Amanda Dunnigan will swim the 200 individual medley. For the Gamecock men, James Crawford, Chris Kelly and Kyle Cormier will go head-to-head with an elite field that includes 2008 Beijing Olympic gold medalist and American record-holder Ryan Lochte in the 200 IM, and Nicholas Walkotten will swim the 50 free, in which Lochte holds the meet record.
Preliminaries get underway at 9:30 a.m. each day with finals set for a 6 p.m. start.
SwimNetwork.com is set to webcast the entire event, and will provide complete coverage throughout the three-day competition. In addition, complete results will be available through USASwimming.com.
South Carolina will take its full contingent of divers to Ohio State for the third straight year, with six of seven already qualified for NCAA Zone competition and looking to improve their scores. The group will also compete in platform diving for the first time this season with prelims and finals in that event set for Sunday. Taryn Zack leads the way for the Gamecock diving contingent, having earned her third SEC Diver of the Week award of the season following her performance at the Gamecock Invitational Nov. 20-22.
The Gamecock divers will face 12 other teams in Columbus as Arizona State, Duke, Indiana, Iowa, Miami, Minnesota, NC State, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue and Florida State will be sending their respective divers. Full coverage for that meet is available at OhioStateBuckeyes.com.
For complete results and coverage of South Carolina swimming and diving, visit GamecocksOnline.com.
