Converesce USA Swimmer and Diver of the Week

IRVING, TEXAS (October 15, 2008) After two weeks of competition, Conference USA women's swimming has had a strong start this season. East Carolina and Houston both ended the week with perfect records. Marshall defeated Xavier (Ohio) 162-114 and Rice outscored North Texas at Texas A&M 184-109. In their only competition to date, SMU took first place honors on Oct. 3 at the Mean Green Relays in Keller, Texas.

Houston's Sasha Schwendenwein is Conference USA's first Swimmer of the Week for the 2008-09 season after winning each of her eight events over the weekend against Southwestern and North Texas and helping the Cougars to a 2-0 record. All-American and Olympian teammate Anastasia Pozdniakova is the Diver of the Week. Pozdniakova returned from the 2008 Olympics and automatically qualified for the NCAA Zone Diving meet after scoring 307.43 points in the 1-meter competition against North Texas.

SWIMMER OF THE WEEK (10/14)
SASHA SCHWENDENWEIN - HOUSTON
Sr., Randburg, South Africa (Crawford College)
Schwendenwein helped lead the Cougars to a 2-0 record after winning all eight of her events over the weekend against Southwestern and North Texas. The senior swimmer was a member of the winning 400-yard medley relay team that finished with a time of 4:13.03 against Southwestern. In the same meet, she took the top spot in the 50-yard freestyle clocking a time of 25.45, finished first in the 200-yard backstroke with a time of 2:11.45 and ended the meet with a win in the 200-yard IM in 2:10.90. Against North Texas, Schwendenwein won the 200-yard butterfly with a time of 2:05.43 and the 100-yard freestyle in 51.92. In her final two races of the day, she won the 500-yard freestyle with a time of 5:04.30 while her time of 3:33.14 gave her the top spot in the 400-yard freestyle relay. The weekly award is the third of Schwendenwein's career.

DIVER OF THE WEEK (10/14)
ANASTASIA POZDNIAKOVA - HOUSTON
Jr., Elektrostal, Russia (Secondary General Education School No. 16)
Pozdniakova helped the Cougars to a win over North Texas in the first home meet of the 2008-09 season. She won both the 1-meter competition scoring 307.43 points and the 3-meter competition after scoring 281.70 points in the event. Both scores qualified her for the NCAA Zone Diving meet. In the 1-meter competition, Pozdniakova was the only diver to surpass 300 points and helped the Cougars to a sweep in the top three places in each event. Pozdniakova was named the Conference USA Diver of the Meet after winning both the 1-meter and 3-meter championship during the 2007 C-USA Swimming and Diving Championships. She was a red-shirt last season and did not compete for the Cougars as she trained for the Olympics where she earned silver medalist honors. This is the junior's fifth career weekly honor.

OTHER NOTABLE PERFORMANCES

AMANDA DUNCAN - East Carolina
Duncan helped lead the Pirates to head-to-head victories over Marshall, West Virginia and Xavier (Ohio). The senior swimmer posted first-place finishes in the 100 butterfly and 200 butterfly.

Siobhan Schuurman - Marshall
Schuurman helped Marshall to a win over Xavier with first-place finishes in both the 1-meter and 3-meter. Schuurman is the school record-holder in both the 1-meter and platform dives.

Angela Wo - Rice
Wo was one of Rice's top performers in the owl's season-opening double-dual meet against nationally-ranked Texas A&M and the University of North Texas. In addition to a second-place finish in the 100-yard butterfly, Wo also posted a career-best time of 2:06.47 to take fourth in the 200-fly.

Christy-Leigh Lategan - SMU
Lategan was a member of four relay teams that placed first. She helped her team in the with the 800-yard freestyle relay by swimming the fastest time of 1:52.05. The freshman swimmer also swam in the 500- yard freestyle relay winning with a time of 4:29.79, almost six seconds faster than the second place finishers. SMU won the North Texas Relays by placing first in eight of ten events.