March 27, 2010

Championships Central | Live Results

MADISON, Wis. -- If recent history is any indicator, watch out for Daniel Lester on the final day of the 2010 NCAA Men's Swimming and Diving Championships.

Following the pattern he established last month at the Big Ten championships, the Wisconsin freshman moved up the standings on the second day of the national meet Saturday with a 20th-place finish in the 400-yard individual medley.

Lester clocked in at 3:48.29 and finished four spots out of scoring position, as the top 16 finishers in the preliminaries advance to the evening finals session. Michigan's Tyler Clary is the top seed for the final after swimming 3:41.28 to finish atop the rundown in the prelims.

Lester's performance came on the heels of his 31st-place finish in the 200-yard IM to open the championships Friday at the McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion in Columbus, Ohio.

With one day of competition remaining, Lester will look to jump up the standings even further on Sunday, when he swims in the 200-yard butterfly.

That was the model he established in the same pool at last month's Big Ten meet, where he scored a fifth-place finish in the 200 IM before grabbing third in the 400 IM a day later and then wrapping up the meet with a runner-up finish in the 200 fly.

The final day of the championships gets underway with prelims at 11 a.m. Sunday. Finals are set for 6 p.m.