King finishes third in 50 freestyle at NCAA

Michele King of Tennessee lowered her own school record and placed third in the 50-yard freestyle on Thursday night at the NCAA Swimming and Diving championships in College Station, Texas.

King's time of 21.82 seconds bettered her runner-up performance (21.86) at last year's NCAA meet. King finished just behind Georgia's Anne-Marie Botek (21.80) and Arizona's Lara Jackson (21.40) at the Student Recreation Center Natatorium.

"Michele put a lot of heart into her race," Lady Vols coach Matt Kredich said. "Her last quarter was phenomenal, she's just ran out of room. She's had some trouble with her starts, but she finishes so well. It's great to get her best time, though. And we're certainly not disappointed in third-place."

King also earned All-America honors on both the 400 medley and 200 free relays.

She joined junior Jamie Saffer, freshman Jenny Connolly and sophomore Morgan Farrell on the 400 medley relay that finished eighth in the finals in 3:34.71.

In the prelims, King, Saffer, Connolly and sophomore Tricia Weaner broke the UT record in 3:32.61. The previous best of 3:34.90 was set at SEC meet last month.

The 200 free relay finished 13th in 1:29.51. Joining King on the relay were Connolly and seniors Katie Gehring and Brittany Nauta.

In the prelims, King had the fastest lead-off split in UT history (21.92).

"The 200 free relay was better tonight," Kredich said. "It was good to move up a couple of spots. We had to make some changes in the 400 free relay, and we had a couple of good legs from Morgan Farrell and Jamie Saffer. All in all, today was good start to the meet. We had some solid efforts."

Arizona smashed two NCAA and American records en route to winning the 200 free relay (1:26.20) and the 400 medley relay (3:28.31).

Arizona leads with 141.5 points. Georgia is second (133), while California third (126). UT is 10th with 46 points, one spot ahead of SEC champion Florida (43).

Sophomore Aleksa Akerfelds did not avance in the 500 free (4:52.50).

Freshman Gabrielle Trudeau scored 239.00 during the prelims of the 1-meter diving competition and did not advance to the finals.

Men's Tennis: The fourth-ranked UT men's tennis team defeated Penn State 4-0 in the first round of the Blue Gray Tennis Classic in Montgomery, Ala.

UT (11-3) won the first set in five of six singles matches after winning the doubles point.

John-Patrick Smith, Boris Conkic and Matteo Fago won singles matches.

"It was a good challenge for us in the first round," UT coach Sam Winterbotham said.

The Vols face 33rd-ranked Texas Tech (9-5) in the second round today.