#HawaiiSWIM | #HawaiiDIVE

LOS ANGELES – The University of Hawai'i women's swimming and diving team defended its crown as Mountain Pacific Sports Federation (MPSF) Champions, concluding competition on Saturday with a 200-point victory. Meanwhile, the men's team finished second by a mere 46.5 points, netting its highest finish since 2014.With this week's efforts, second-year head swimming and diving coachput together the best two-team finish for UH since the 2011 season, when UH competed in Conference USA."I couldn't be more proud of this group of women, and couldn't be more proud to work with this coaching staff," Schemmel said. "This championship was a true team effort."Opening the day in the home stretch at the East Los Angeles College Swim Stadium, sophomorebroke her own school 1650 freestyle record by over 30 seconds, knocking down the MPSF record with a gold-medal time of 15:54.31, recording the first win on the day for the Rainbow Wahine.That was only the first record to fall on Saturday, as senioralso knocked off Jasmine Alkhaldi's (2015) conference record in the 100 freestyle with a time of 48.05, while freshman Anna Kotenen (50.82) was fifth.Weidner registered her final record mark of the day and sixth of the weekend, anchoring the women's 400 freestyle relay to a time of 3:18.33, snapping UH's standing MPSF and school records in tandem with junior, Kotenen and seniorThe Rainbow Wahine divers did their part for the third consecutive day to lead UH to the MPSF crown, sweeping the top three spots off the 10-meter platform. Although freshmanpicked up wins off both the 1- and 3-meter springboards, seniorwas the victor of the platform, winning the event with a dominant NCAA-qualifying score of 318.20. Houser and senioralso reach NCAA marks, producing scores of 238.35 and 238.05 for silver and bronze, respectively.The Rainbow Warriors also locked up three gold medals on the day, kicked off by juniorwith an NCAA B-cut victory in the 200 backstroke, turning in a time of 1:41.52. Sophomorewas right behind, finishing third in 1:42.54.Just two events later,earned the win in the 200 breaststroke with a B-cut time of 1:57.38.Closing out the diving competition at the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center in Pasadena, Calif., juniorearned gold off the platform with an NCAA-qualifying score of 365.70, just ahead of sophomorewith an NCAA score of 355.10.In the pool, Gutzat also recorded a second-place finish in the 1650 free with a B-cut time of 15:19.62. Sophomoreadded a bronze for UH in the 200 butterfly with a B-cut 1:46.62. Rounding out the competition for UH, Chaba and Aydin made the final two legs of the 400 freestyle relay, along with juniorand freshman Adam Franz, earning second with a combined time of 2:56.56.In the women's 200 backstroke, UH locked up fourth through sixth place with the top performance going to junior(2:00.19), ahead of seniors(2:00.70) and(2:00.99).The Rainbow Wahine finished with a four-day score of 848, beating out UC Santa Barbara at 643. The Rainbow Warriors were unable to overcome UCSB's third-day lead, finishing with 670.5 points behinds the Gauchos at 717.Including Saturday's finish, the UH women produced nine new conference records, paced by Weidner, with three individual marks and three relays (800 free relay, 200 IM, 200 free, 400 medley relay, 100 free, 400 free relay), while Hines added two new individual marks (500 free, 1650 free). Sthamann's platform dive also surpassed her own conference mark.The UH men also added a record mark in the 200 medley relay by Aydin, Kokko, Chaba and Wynn.In total, UH swimming won 15 events on the week, garnering 30 top-three finishes. The UH women earned eight gold-medal performances: (800 free relay, 500 free, 200 IM, 100 free, 400 medley relay, 1650 free, 100 free, 400 free relay). The men tallied seven first-place performances ((200 free relay, 200 IM, 100 fly, 100 breast, 100 back, 200 back, 200 breast).At the diving competition, UH won four total events and registered 12 top-three finishes, led by four winning performances; three for the Rainbow Wahine (1m, 3m, Platform) and one for Rainbow Warriors (Platform).Next on the schedule for Hawai'i diving is the NCAA Zone E Diving Championships, scheduled for March 5-7 at Northern Arizona's Douglas J. Wall Aquatic Center in Flagstaff, Ariz. The swimming teams qualifiers return to competition at the NCAA Championships, March 21-24, at the University Aquatic Center (men) in Minneapolis, Minn. and the McCorkle Aquatic Center (women) in Columbus, Ohio.