The No. 2 Stanford women’s swimming and diving squad (2-0, 1-0 Pac-10) has been busy, coming face-to-face with two Pac-10 rivals in the past week. Last Saturday, the swimmers took on the Washington Huskies (1-2, 0-2 Pac-10) at the Avery Aquatic Center in their first official conference meet of the season. Yesterday, the divers bounced into action against their Bay Area rivals, the No. 3 California Golden Bears, in the diving-only, non-conference event.

The Cardinal responded well to its first competitions against Pacific-10 Conference foes, with the Stanford swimmers outscoring the Huskies 116-89. Although the diving event was not team-scored, the divers displayed some promising performances that should give them confidence for later in the season.

The win over the Huskies was no easy feat for the Cardinal swimmers, who only maintained a 6-point lead after 6 of 11 events. However, the Card rallied towards the end, going on to defeat the Huskies by 27 points. Stanford head coach Lea Maurer was satisfied with the meet, despite the team being tired from tough practices.

“We swam a different lineup and relied on more people, and we got better as the meet went on,” said Maurer. “We’re obviously tired [from hard workouts], but we’re finding a way to get the win box checked, and I feel that’s a good place to be right now.”

Stanford managed to snag wins in seven of the 11 events. A new pool record was set by Stanford’s 800-yard freestyle relay team. The relay squad of Julia Smit, Brooke Bishop, Whitney Spence and Kate Dwelley swam to a time of 7:17.08, a full three-and-a-half seconds ahead of the previous record set by Auburn University in 2002.

“The record was good,” said Maurer. “It’s always good to put Stanford on as the team for your own pool records. We feel like the 800 free relay is going to be something that we’re a more formidable opponent in this year. It’s nice to have our swimmers look at an event and say `O.K., we can get this [record].’ That’s what champions do. They walk in a pool, look at the board and say `what can we erase.’”

Sophomore Julia Smit took Maurer’s champion philosophy to heart when she won the 400-yard individual medley. Even though her time of 4:09.97 was slightly short of Stanford great Summer Sanders’ pool record of 4:08.52 set in 1992, Smit still managed to defeat Washington freshman Ariana Kukors, who is currently ranked fourth in the world in the 400-meter individual medley. Though early in the season, Smit’s time would have placed her sixth at last year’s NCAA Championships, as well as second place at last year’s Pac-10 Championships, slightly behind her own mark.

“It was exciting, because I went faster than I did in any dual meet last year,” said Smit about the swim. “It was a good point to start. I was also pretty happy that I beat Ariana [Kukors]. She’s a really tough competitor, and I’m going to be racing her at the end so I need to practice racing her now.”

Other Stanford event winners included freshman Kate Dwelley in the 100 freestyle, junior Andrea Axtell in the 200 backstroke, seniors Brooke Bishop in the 50 freestyle and Caroline Bruce in the 200 breaststroke, and the 400 medley relay squad of Bishop, Bruce, Elaine Breeden, and Madeline Rovira. Washington swept the three longer freestyle races — the 200, 500, and 1000 — as well as the 200 butterfly.

Meanwhile, the divers, led by head coach Rick Schavone, were showing their stuff against California yesterday in the one-meter and three-meter dives, the two events of the day. Unlike in traditional meets, each diver was paired with a teammate, and their combined score was tallied. The Stanford freshman duo of Meg Hostage and Hallie Ivester joined forces to post the highest combined score in the 3-meter diving, while Cal’s Samantha Young and Laura Sanford combined for the win in the 1-meter. In the individual point tallies, Stanford appeared dominant, although the events were not team-scored. Hostage recorded the highest score of the day in both the 1-meter and 3-meter diving, and the Card occupied five of the top six spots in the 3-meter event.

Both the swimmers and divers will reconvene across the nation in Athens, Ga., this Friday for a dual meet against the No. 5 Georgia Bulldogs. This will be the first dual meet between the Cardinal and the ‘Dawgs since 2001. The meet will take place at the Gabrielson Natatorium in Athens at 11 a.m. PST.