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Sports

UH finishes third in C-USA tournament

Cagnotto, Kiess, Pozdniakova sweep platform diving competition in tournament 

by JONG LEE
The Daily Cougar 

The Houston Cougars hosted the Conference USA Championships this weekend at the Campus Recreation and Wellness Center Natatorium. Southern Methodist University dominated throughout the competition. SMU set 23 new meet records and the closest score was East Carolina University with 587 points, 259 points off SMU's score.

"SMU is one of the best teams in the country and that has been for many years," Taylor said. "They came from the Western Athletic Conference, and I think they won every single conference championship for the last few years. I can't tell you when the last time they haven't won one. They are so strong and so dominant, I mean when we found out they were going to be in our conference we were ecstatic. Knowing we're going to have to face that type of competition, our girls stepped up."

The Cougars finished just two points behind the Pirates. Houston's divers would give dominating performances, including freshman Tania Cagnotto who crushed her opponents by almost 60 points on the platforms. The Cougars swept the platforms, Cagnotto taking first with 331.80 points, junior Anna Kiess finishing second with 272.70 points and freshman Anastasia Pozdniakova took third with 247.50 points.

"Tania Cognotto is one of the best divers in the world," Taylor said. "She won all three of the events for diving and she was just outstanding, as well as all of our divers. They did a fabulous job just like the swimmers did. We all had people stepping up and doing unbelievable things. We had Randee Billups who is a captain, won the consolation final in the 200-breaststroke and the divers went one, two, three, four, five in the platform diving. At that point we were ready to get the broom out for the sweep."

It was very close between Rice, Houston and ECU coming into the final day of competition. After the first day, SMU led all teams with 80 points, Rice trailed with 66 and Houston and ECU were tied for third with 62 points. 

Tulane and Marshall followed up the rear with 58 and 52 points respectively.

The Cougars moved into second after the second day of competition, with 213 points. The Mustangs furthered their lead to 318 points, the Pirates had 195 points, the Owls with 152 points, the Green Wave with 136 points and the Thundering Herd finished with 85 points.

The competition really tightened up after the third day. Houston finished second with 374 points, Rice had 372.5 points and East Carolina had 362 points. Tulane and Marshall finished up with 284.5 and 164 points. SMU, by this point, had run away with the conference championship with 684 points.

"It was an outstanding competition," head coach Mark Taylor said. "We swam unbelievably well. Our girls all were doing super. Everybody did best times. I probably never had such a successful swimming meet as a coach before. We just barely missed second place in the team race by two points. We still finished third, which is really great. It's one of our highest finishes in the last few years and we got seven NCAA B-Qualifying times, we broke nine school records, Szintia Szanto won the 200 breaststroke, Andrea Pa'lmai won the 400 IM, both of them set new pool and conference records in the process. Our medley relay in the 200 and 400, broke school records and were second place, everybody did best times."

Next up for the Cougars will be the NCAA Zone Diving, from March 10 through 12 at Columbia, Mo. From March 16 to 18, the NCAA Championships will take place in Athens, Ga.
 

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