Sanders Coming Back, Evans Falling Back : Swimming: Brooke Bennett completes sweep over world-record holder with victory in 1,500.

Amy Van Dyken set a U.S. record in the 50-meter freestyle, and Brooke Bennett won her third national title in handing Janet Evans her first defeat in the 1,500-meter free in eight years, but it was a second-place finish by a woman on a comeback that provided the most compelling moment of the final day of the Phillips 66 National Swimming Championships.

The parade of big-name swimmers congratulating Summer Sanders on Friday night at the Rose Bowl Aquatics Center after she rallied in the 200-meter individual medley to take second behind Allison Wagner illustrated the depth of her surprising performance.

Sanders, 22, the swimming star of the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, decided to re-enter the pool this spring after retiring in January of 1994. After 18 weeks of training, she came into this week’s national championships a bit sluggish and getting more frustrated with each defeat. Her best finish before Friday was a sixth in the 200-meter butterfly.

“When you’re on top, it’s hard to accept it,” Sanders said. “It’s hard to have perspective when you’re out of the sport.”

Evans, another Olympic star, got a dose of perspective after failing to add to her 45 national titles, making her quest to reach Tracy Caulkins Stockwell’s national record of 48 a distant possibility in her final year of competition.

Evans recorded the fastest time in the morning’s preliminaries by almost 11 seconds, but she lost contact with Bennett after 500 yards in the final and finished fifth.

The world-record holder finished behind four teen-agers: Bennett, Trina Jackson, 18; Jessica Foschi, 14, and Jamie Johnson, 18. Bennett also won the 400 and 800 free.

Evans said she will have her tonsils removed next week instead of going to Atlanta to compete in the Pan Pacific Championships at the Olympic pool at Georgia Tech.

Van Dyken, 22, training with Sanders and the resident national team in Colorado Springs, amazed herself with a record-setting swim of 25.13 seconds in the 50 free. She entered the meet expecting little after Jonty Skinner, their coach, told his swimmers they were not rested enough to succeed at the nationals.

Van Dyken said even some of her teammates feigned surprise by her fast time.

“They said they couldn’t believe it,” she said. “I said, ‘I know.’ ”

Most surprising, perhaps, was Sanders. She took an early lead in the butterfly leg, but lost it to Jennifer Parmenter, 14, of Granda Hills during the backstroke. Sanders regained the lead during the breaststroke but Wagner also moved up to challenge.

Wagner, of Gainesville, Fla., edged Sanders at the wall in the final freestyle sprint with a time of 2:15.99. Parmenter was third.

“The bubbly, exciting personality came out tonight,” Skinner said. “Earlier she had a little trepidation. She made rookie type mistakes.”

In the past 18 weeks, Sanders has discovered even a year off is too much for a world-class swimmer to make a splashy return. She hasn’t forgotten how to race, but to race as fast as she did when she won four medals in Barcelona was asking too much.

The Stanford graduate learned a lesson this week:

“The comeback part is not as easy as I thought,” she said.

Swimming Notes

Tom Jager, 30, a five-time Olympic gold medalist from UCLA, failed to make the final in the 50 freestyle, won by Jon Olsen in 22.42 seconds, well off Jager’s world record of 21.81. Jager was 13th in 23.09. . . . Jennifer Parmenter, on the 200 IM final with Olympians Summer Sanders and Jenny Thompson: “I was just excited to be swimming with [them].”