Feb. 24, 2010
COLUMBUS, Ohio - The 18th-ranked Purdue men's swimming and diving team opened the 2010 Big Ten Championships on Wednesday evening inside the McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion on the campus of Ohio State University.
"We dug a hole for ourselves points-wise, but we had some guys swim really well," head coach Dan Ross said. "It was a new experience for us swimming on Wednesday night at Big Tens. Now that we have raced, we can coach. It will be interesting to see who steps up for us tomorrow."
Purdue's 800-yard freestyle relay swam to a season-best time that improved their NCAA provisional-qualifying standing and moved to second on the program's all-time performance list. A.J. Boeh, Ben Wachtel, Drew Wolfred and Gage Barry completed the race in 6:32.30 to lower the team's previous season-best clocking by more than nine seconds.
The Boilermakers began the meet with a season-best and NCAA provisional-qualifying time in the 200 medley relay. Chuck Destro, Aaron Koger, Jimmy Brooks and Wachtel moved to fifth on Purdue's all-time performance list and finished 10th in the event when the quartet completed the race in 1:29.03.
Action continues Thursday with a preliminary session set for noon ET to be followed by finals at 7 p.m. The first session features competition in the 500 freestyle, 200 IM, 50 freestyle and 1-meter diving, with finals in each event plus the 400 medley relay in the evening session. Live results and live video from the championships can be found at purduesports.com.