Swimmers Ready for NCAA Championships
3/14/2012 12:00:00 AM | Swimming & Diving
March 14, 2012
AUBURN, Ala. - The Alabama women's swimming and diving team went through its last practice of the season Wednesday with more of a warm up at the James E. Martin Aquatic Center in Auburn, Ala., site of this year's NCAA Championships. Now all that remains is three days of competition at the national championships.
"Everything's going well, everyone looked good in the water today and now we're just ready to get things underway tomorrow at 11 a.m.," UA head coach Eric McIlquham said during Wednesday's practice day in Auburn. "I think we're going to do well. Everyone is looking good, really excited to be here and ready to get going."
The Crimson Tide gets the championships started on Thursday with sophomore Alex Popa and freshman Kaylin Burchell in the 200 individual medley and sophomore Kristel Vourna in the 50 freestyle.
"I think those are good events for us to start off with," McIlquham said. "And Friday should be a real good day for us as we move into the 100s of the strokes."
In addition to the 50 freestyle, Vourna will swim the 100 butterfly. After opening with the 200 IM, Popa and Burchell will swim the 100 and 200 breaststrokes.
Vourna, who holds the school record in the 100 butterfly, finished 17th at the NCAA Championships in that event as a rookie in 2011. Popa, making her first NCAA Championships appearance, is ranked third all-time at Alabama in the 200 breaststroke. Burchell is second all-time at UA in the 100 breaststroke, just behind UA All-American and Olympic bronze medalist Anne Poleska.
Preliminaries will get underway at 11 a.m. CDT each day while finals are slated to start at 7 p.m. CDT. Prelims for all three days as well as Thursday's finals will stream live on NCAA.com while finals on Friday and Saturday will be on ESPN3.
Players Mentioned
