Sports Briefs

JDHS grad to swim at NCAA finals

WATERVILLE, Maine - JDHS graduate and Colby College senior Kelsey Potdevin will head back to the NCAA Division III Swimming and Diving Championships for a fourth straight year when that meet starts on Wednesday and runs through Saturday at the University of Minnesota.

Potdevin, the school record holder in all the backstroke events, will swim in the 50-yard freestyle on the opening day of the meet. She is seeded ninth in Friday's 100-yard backstroke and is seeded 30th for the 200 backstroke on Saturday.

Potdevin set a meet and pool record with a clocking of :26.56 in the 50 backstroke at the recent New England Small College Athletic Conference Championships. The NCAA, however, does not have the 50 backstroke among the races at the meet. Potdevin also placed second in the 100 backstroke with a time of :57.39 at the NESCAC meet.

UCLA tops Beavers in Pac-10 tourney

LOS ANGELES - Atonye Nyingifa had 18 points and 10 rebounds as UCLA rallied for a 62-56 victory against Oregon State in the quarterfinals of the Pac-10 tournament on Friday night.

Sophomore guard and JDHS graduate Talisa Rhea chipped in 11 points, three assists and three rebounds in 36 minutes of action for Oregon State.

Darxia Morris and Doreena Campbell had 10 points each for the fourth-seeded Bruins (19-11), who will play No. 2 Stanford in a semifinal on Saturday. The Cardinal beat ninth-seeded Arizona 77-46 and has won four of the last five conference tournament championships.

Brittney Davis led the fifth-seeded Beavers (19-11) with 22 points.

The Bruins, which lost in the semifinals last year, trailed by as many as nine early in the second half. Rebekah Gardner's 3-pointer with 5:51 left gave UCLA a 46-45 lead, its first since going up 8-5.

From there the teams exchanged the lead until the Bruins went ahead 51-49 when Nyingifa converted a 3-point play. UCLA never relinquished the lead.

UCLA out-rebounded Oregon State 43-28 and avenged a 61-58 loss to the Beavers less than a week ago.

Denver sweeps UAA in WCHA playoffs

DENVER - Denver needed a last-minute goal to sweep Alaska-Anchorage in the first-round Western Collegiate Hockey Association playoff series Saturday night.

Freshman Luke Salazar scored the game-winning goal for the Denver Pioneers with only 47.4 seconds remaining in the third period. Denver won without leading scorer Tyler Ruegsegger, who is out for the season with a knee injury he received Friday night against UAA.

With the victory, Denver heads to the WCHA Final Five for the second consecutive season and the third time in five years.

FRIDAY

Denver 3, UAA 2

No. 5 Denver rallied from a two-goal deficit to beat Alaska-Anchorage 3-2 in the opening game of their first-round Western Collegiate Hockey Association playoff series Friday night.

The Seawolves jumped out to a 2-0 lead on goals by Luka Vidmar and Kevin Clark, but Tyler Ruegsegger scored a pair of goals in the second period for Denver.