Atlanta, Ga - Three Stanford swimmers and one relay team advanced to the championship finals during Saturday's preliminaries at the 2006 NCAA Men's Swimming & Diving Championship at the Georgia Tech Aquatic Center.
Hongzhe Sun, the 2006 Pac-10 champion in the 200 back, was Stanford's highest finisher in the prelims with a second place finish. Sun was timed in a season-best 1:40.78 (#4 all-time at Stanford), just behind Florida's Ryan Lochte at 1:40.07. Ben Wildman-Tobriner, the Pac-10 champion in the 100 free, placed fourth in the prelims at a season-best 42.71. The day's best time was turned in by Simon Burnett of Arizona at 42.39. Freshman Paul Kornfeld was sixth in the prelims of the 200 breast with a time of 1:56.20. Alabama's Vlad Polyakov was the prelim leader at 1:55.62.
The Cardinal 400 free relay team of Jason Dunford, Matt Crowe, Kyle Ransom and Ben Wildman-Tobriner had the prelims' sixth best time at 2:54.36. Arizona led the field at 2:52.24.
The conclusion of the three-day meet will be Saturday night.