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March 13, 2012

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2012 NCAA Women's Swimming & Diving Championships Thursday, March 15 - Saturday, March 17 | James E. Martin Aquatics Center | Auburn, Ala.

NCAA Championship Information

Live Results - Swimming | Live Results - Diving | Auburn Notes

Live Video Thursday Prelims Thursday Finals Friday Prelims Friday Finals (ESPN3) Saturday Prelims Saturday Finals (ESPN3)

AUBURN, Ala. - Auburn will play host to the NCAA Women's Swimming & Diving Championships for the second time in the last 10 years as the national championship meet runs Thursday-Saturday at the James E. Martin Aquatics Center on the Auburn campus.

Preliminaries begin each day at 11 a.m. and finals will start each evening at 7 p.m. A total of 324 swimmers and divers from 71 schools will compete in the three-day meet.

TICKETS AND PARKING
A limited number of all-session reserved tickets will be made available for $65 each at the James E. Martin Aquatics Center ticket office beginning at 9:30 a.m. Thursday. In addition, single-session, standing-room-only tickets will be available prior to each session. The prices for those tickets will be $10 for preliminaries and $15 for finals.

Parking will be free for spectators and available in any of the campus lots near the Aquatic Center. Fans are encouraged to park in the East Coliseum lot.

TV, LIVE VIDEO AND LIVE RESULTS
ESPN3 will carry a live broadcast of the finals sessions on Friday and Saturday. The remaining four sessions will be streamed live via AUHD on CBSSports.com. There is no charge for the video streams for the prelims sessions or Thursday's finals.

Live results for the swimming portion of the meet will be available through NCAA.com, and live results for diving can be found at DiveMeets.com. In addition, fans can follow @AuburnSwimming on Twitter for updates throughout the week.

A complete schedule of events can be found at the end of this release.

ABOUT THE TIGERS
Auburn will have a total of 13 competitors - 11 swimmers and two divers - in the meet, which ties for the fourth-most entries of any team in the meet. The Tiger women have won five NCAA Championships, capturing the title in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006 and 2007. Auburn is making its 33rd appearance at the NCAA Championships, where on 20 occasions the Tigers have finished in the top 10. The Tiger women have claimed 24 individual national championships and seven relay titles in those appearances. Seven of those championships came at the 2003 NCAA meet, the last time Auburn played host to the event.

Auburn's 13 competitors in the meet consist of nine Tigers making a return trip to the national meet and three freshmen and one sophomore making their first NCAA appearances.

Seniors: Anna Aguero, Vennie Dantin, Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace
Juniors: Katie Gardocki, Becca Jones, Lauren Norberg, Hannah Riordan
Sophomores: Emily Bos, Haley Krakoski, Olivia Scott
Freshmen: Abby Duncan, Megan Fonteno, Sarah Peterson

A LOOK AT AUBURN'S SWIMMERS
Auburn will have 11 swimmers competing in their home pool at the 2012 NCAA Championships, including one that will wear the "AU" cap for the final time as a collegian.

Senior Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace will leave Auburn after this week's championships as one of the most decorated swimmers in Tiger history. The NCAA record-holder in the 100 freestyle (46.61), she enters as the defending NCAA Champion in both the 50 free and 100 free and with an eye on rewriting the record books. She'll also be a medal contender in the 100 fly and an integral part of four Auburn relays that could contend for national titles. Vanderpool-Wallace is an 18-time All-American and could finish with 25 honors after this week's meet, which would rank her second in Auburn history.

She'll have some help in the sprints and relays from junior Hannah Riordan and sophomores Olivia Scott, Haley Krakoski and Emily Bos. Riordan looks to improve on a 28th-place finish in the 50 and a 20th-place showing in the 100 at last year's NCAAs, while Krakoski makes her first appearance at the championship meet.

Scott enters as one of the nation's top competitors in the 100 butterfly with a season-best time of 51.86. She took sixth place at last year's NCAA meet with a 52.29 and enters as the No. 5 seed in the event. She will also enter both sprints, looking to improve on her finishes from last year's meet, and she'll swim the butterfly leg on both medley relays.

Bos earned All-America honors in the 100 backstroke last year and comes into this week's meet with an eye on another. She'll also be an integral part of both medley relays and the 200 and 400 free relays.

Junior Katie Gardocki could provide a major boost to the Auburn score in the distance events. She finished 13th in the 1650 freestyle last year, and figures to be in the mix to score in both that event and the 500. She will also swim on the 800 freestyle relay team, as well as the 200 freestyle. Gardocki was the bronze medalist in the mile at the SEC Championships last month.

Another junior, Lauren Norberg, makes her third NCAA appearance as the Tigers' breaststroke specialist. She'll be part of both medley relays and also swim the 100 and 200 breaststroke events. A fourth junior, Becca Jones, will be part of the 800 free relay team and look to contrtibute to the scoring in the 200 free.

Three freshmen - Abby Duncan, Megan Fonteno and Sarah Peterson - make their first NCAA appearances. Duncan will swim the breaststroke events, Fonteno will enter the sprints and the 400 and 800 free relays, and Peterson will look to contribute in the IM events.

DIVING RIGHT IN
Seniors Vennie Dantin and Anna Aguero return for their last shot at an NCAA title. Dantin is a four-time All-American and qualified for the meet by winning both the 1- and 3-meter title at the NCAA Zone B Diving meet last week. She also finished second in the platform event. At last year's NCAA Championships, she earned two All-America honors on the 1-meter and platform events.

Dantin has two SEC titles to her credit, a win on the 3-meter board at the 2010 championships, and has earned four other medals with three runner-up finishes and a third-place showing in her three previous conference meets. Dantin was a force for the Tigers during the dual-meet season, winning 15 times in 22 events and earning five nods as SEC Diver of the Week.

Aguero, meanwhile, seeks to add to her collection of two All-America honors. She has one win on the year, taking the top spot on 1-meter at the Georgia Diving Invitational, and she qualified for the NCAA meet by finishing third in the 1-meter event at the NCAA Zone meet last week.

Coach Jeff Shaffer, in his 13th season, has coached three Auburn women's divers to an SEC title, but is still looking for his first NCAA women's champion.

AUBURN'S ALL-AMERICANS
Between the men's and women's programs, Auburn has 2,130 All-Americans in its history. The Auburn women will have eight swimmers and divers with 41 All-America honors among them competing at this week's NCAA Championships:
• Anna Aguero (2)
• Emily Bos (5)
• Vennie Dantin (4)
• Katie Gardocki (2)
• Lauren Norberg (2)
• Hannah Riordan (5)
• Olivia Scott (3)
• Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace (18)

A LOOK BACK: 2011 NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS
Auburn capped off the 2011 season with an eighth-place finish at the NCAA Women's Swimming and Diving Championships held at the Lee and Joe Jamail Texas Swimming Center on the campus of the University of Texas in Austin.

Cal won the meet with 424 points followed by Georgia in second with 394.5. USC (351), Stanford (272), Arizona (266), Texas (232), Florida (226), Auburn (202), Minnesota (192) and Texas A&M (182) round out the top 10.

Then-junior Arianna Vanderpool-Wallace captured the 50- and 100-yard freestyle championships, the first in Auburn history in both events. Auburn garnered a total of 26 All-America honors during the meet, led by Vanderpool-Wallace with six. Vennie Dantin advanced to finals in two of three diving events as well.

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

Thursday, March 15
11 a.m. -- Prelims
-200 freestyle relay
-500 freestyle
-200 individual medley
-50 freestyle
-400 medley relay
1:30 p.m. -- 1-meter diving prelims
3:30 p.m. -- 1-meter diving consolation
7 p.m. -- Finals
-200 freestyle relay
-500 freestyle
-200 individual medley
-1-meter diving
-400 medley relay

Friday, March 16
11 a.m. -- Prelims
-200 medley relay
-400 individual medley
-100 butterfly
-200 freestyle
-100 breaststroke
-100 backstroke
1:30 p.m. --3-meter diving prelims
3:30 p.m. --3-meter diving consolation
7 p.m. -- Finals
-200 medley relay
-400 individual medley
-100 butterfly
-200 freestyle
-100 breaststroke
-100 backstroke
-3-meter diving
-800 freestyle relay (timed finals)

Saturday, March 17
11 a.m. -- Prelims
-200 backstroke
-100 freestyle
-200 breaststroke
-200 butterfly
-400 freestyle relay
1:30 p.m. -- Platform diving prelims
3 p.m. -- Platform diving consolation
5 p.m. (approx.) -- 1650 freestyle (all but fastest heat)
7 p.m. -- Finals
-1650 freestyle (fastest heat)
-200 backstroke
-100 freestyle
-200 breaststroke
-200 butterfly
-Platform diving
-400 freestyle relay

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