UCLA swim and dive team splits weekend games in Arizona

The swim and dive team’s performance in the state of Arizona over the weekend told a tale of two cities.

UCLA split a pair of dual meets against Pac-10 foes, defeating Arizona State on Friday in Tempe, Ariz., and falling to Arizona the very next day in Tucson, Ariz.

Friday against Arizona State (3-3, 1-2 Pac-10), many Bruins (3-1, 2-1) broke personal records in a solid all-around performance for the team. In all, 34 personal-best marks were posted as UCLA won nine of the 16 events. With the near three-dozen career performances, the Bruins won 160-140.

“I was happy with how we swam and competed against Arizona State,” swim coach Cyndi Gallagher said. “They did a good job of getting their hand on the wall and winning a lot of races.”

Junior Brittany Beauchan continued her impressive season in breaststroke events against the Sun Devils. For the second straight meet, Beauchan won the 100-yard breaststroke, 200-yard breaststroke and helped the 200-yard medley relay team win by swimming the breaststroke leg.

Beauchan set a personal record in the 100-yard breaststroke and also swam below NCAA “B” qualifying standards in both of the individual events.

Two other swimmers also posted times that met NCAA “B” qualifying standards.

Sophomore Yasi Jahanshahi won the 200-yard butterfly in a time of 1:59.45, more than one second below the standard of 2:00.69. Junior Lauren Hall met the mark in the 400-yard individual medley, winning the event in a time of 4:18.32, also more than one second below the standard of 4:19.69.

Saturday against Arizona (3-0, 2-0) was a much different story for the Bruins.

The Wildcats dominated across the board, posting 13 event wins and showing off their form that led them to a national championship two years ago and put away the Bruins, 176-123.

Both teams entered the meet fresh off a win, with UCLA having defeated ASU and Arizona triumphing over USC the day before.

Freshman Laurence Delisle was the only Bruin swimmer to post three individual event wins over the two-day span, winning both the 100-yard and 200-yard backstroke against ASU and winning the 200 individual medley against Arizona. Her time in the 200 backstroke missed the “B” standard by just .63 seconds.

For Delisle, Arizona’s history may have been a mental factor.

“It’s definitely intimidating stepping on the pool deck knowing they were national champions two years ago,” Delisle said. “But we went in there confident.”

The diving team also struggled to find consistency over the weekend.

Junior Laura Winn posted big personal records on both the 1-meter springboard (251.63) and 3-meter springboard (273.53) against ASU, but did not come close to matching that success against Arizona.

Junior Karina Silva recovered from a rough first day at ASU to pick up two second-place finishes in Arizona, but the team was shut out from victory in four events over two days.

“Against ASU we were very disciplined,” Winn said. “(On Saturday), we kind of let that fall apart a little bit.”

Dive coach Tom Stebbins agreed, adding that the Bruins still need to build confidence through experience.

“Our youth kind of showed a little bit this weekend,” Stebbins said. “We still haven’t quite found our identity. We need to develop kind of a swagger.”

Overall, Gallagher saw this weekend as “a good learning lesson” for the program.

“I think we took a lot of steps forward against Arizona State and took a couple backwards against Arizona,” Gallagher said. “We can definitely be better, even against a team like Arizona, who is really dominant and has got a real chance to win NCAAs this year.”

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