The No. 11-ranked California men's swimming team started the conference meet off on a high note, winning the opening event, the 200 medley relay, in a school-record time of 1:25.09 Wednesday at the 2008 Pac-10 Conference Swimming Championships, hosted at the Belmont Plaza Pool in Long Beach, Calif.  Meanwhile the Arizona Wildcats showed that they intend to Challenge Texas' newly-minted US Open record in the 800 freestyle relay.

The Golden Bears, under the direction of first-year coach David Durden, became automatic qualifiers for the NCAA championships in the 200 medley relay as Cal upended favorite Arizona and Stanford to win the conference title. Led by junior David Russell (21.81) in the backstroke, freshman Damir Dugonjic in the breaststroke (23.46), senior Jernej Godec in the butterfly (20.81) and senior Joe Whittington in the freestyle (19.01), the Bears swam the fastest time in school history. The previous school-best time was 1:25.09, set in 2004 (Alex Lim, Caleb Rowe, Milorad Cavic, Duje Draganja). No. 2-ranked Arizona placed second in the 200 medley relay at 1:25.57, while No. 3-ranked Stanford was third with a time of 1:25.59.

In the second event of the day, Arizona's Nicholas Nilo opened up an early lead on the field.  His lead-off of 1:34.91 was nearly a second off his personal best, but enough to put a second on the field.  As he did at NCAA's last year, Jean Basson followed, this time clocking a 1:34.05.  Darian Townsend posted the fastest split of the meet - a 1:33.35 before handing off to Joel Greenshields who closed the deal, finishing in 6:16.77.  Stanford finished second in 6:24.14, just ahead of California's 6:25.89. 

By day's end, the Wildcats with 74, owned a two point lead over the Golden Bears.  Stanford (66), Arizona State (58), Southern Cal (56) and Washington (28) rounded out the field.