Missouri Valley Championships: Day One

CARBONDALE, Illinois, February 14. AT the conclusion on the first day of the 2008 State Farm/Missouri Valley Conference Swimming and Diving Championships Southern Illinois University leads all scorers.

The Salukis hold the lead with 222.5 points, Missouri State is in second with 206 points, Illinois State is in third with 161.5 points, Northern Iowa is in fourth place with 107 points and Evansville is in fifth place with 96 points.

SIU's team of Tovah Gasparovich, Julie Ju, Isabel Madeira and Therese Mattsson picked up a win in the 200-yard freestyle relay with a time of 1:34.50 to jump out to an early lead.

Julie Ju picked up another win for the Salukis with a time of 4:58.33 in the 500-yard freestyle. Also placing in the top eight for SIU was Lisa Jaquez with a time of 5:08.86 for a sixth-place finish.

Missouri State's Andi Rojas-Jimenz won the 200-yard individual medley final with a time of 2:05.45. SIU's top finisher in the event was Danielle Quarry with a time of 2:08.19 for a fourth-place finish.

The MSU Bears picked up another win in the 50-yard freestyle with Jordan Hawkins' first-place time of 23.30 seconds. SIU's Therese Mattsson (23.81), Isabel Madeira (23.94) and Tovah Gasparovich (24.45) took second, third and fourth places, respectively.

SIU's relay team of Kelly Dvorak, Ju, Jacquez and Madeira won the 400-yard freestyle relay with a new SIU pool record, MVC record and MVC Championship record of 3:48.77.

The MVC Championships will resume tomorrow with preliminary races of the 400 IM, 100 Fly, 200 Free, 100 Breast, 100 Back and 3-Meter Diving at 11 a.m. at the SIU Student Recreation Center.

Special thanks to Southern Illinois for contributing this report.

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