SWIMMING PACIFIC 10 CHAMPIONSHIPS : Maurer Leads Surging Stanford

Stanford sophomore Erik Maurer won three gold medals Thursday night to help the nine-time defending champion Cardinal take the lead in the Pacific 10 swimming championships at Belmont Plaza Pool in Long Beach.

The 6-foot-8 sprinter anchored Stanford’s record-setting 200-yard medley relay, downed Olympian Troy Dalbey of Arizona State in the 50 freestyle and anchored the 400 medley relay.

With two days remaining in the 30th annual meet, Stanford leads with 309 points. USC is second with 220 points, followed by UCLA (219), California (169), Arizona (167), Arizona State (156) and Washington (70.5).

Along with three seniors, Maurer was part of the Cardinal team that set the 200 freestyle relay record of 1 minute 19.13 seconds last season. This time he combined with freshmen Bill Schell and Brian Ketterer and junior John de Groot for a 1:18.96.

Jeff Rouse, Matt Rodgers, and Kevin Henderson combined with Maurer on the medley relay victory. Rouse, the 100-meter backstroke world champion, was not expected to compete because he has a broken wrist, but he removed the cast, taped his wrist and was able to clock an NCAA-qualifying 48.16 seconds on the opening 100 backstroke leg.

In the other events, Cal’s Scott Jaffe won the 200 individual medley in a meet record 1:47.18, and Marius Podkoscielny, an Arizona junior from Poland, won the 500 freestyle in 4:18.68.