GRAND JUNCTION, Colo.— The Colorado Mesa University swimming and diving teams combined to win each of the final nine events and set five meet and three school records, plus a new pool standard during another fine day of competition on Thursday at the A3 Performance Invitational here at El Pomar Natatorium.
 
The Mavericks, who also combined for 22 NCAA Division II Championship qualifying performances throughout the day, have now won all but one of the 16 events thus far in the 4-day meet, which got underway on Wednesday, opening up commanding team scoring leads.
 
The nation's sixth-ranked CMU men, who have won all eight events, now lead No. 19 Colorado School of Mines by 231 points, 624-393.  Meanwhile, the No. 7 ranked Maverick women extended their lead to 141 points (517-376) over Division I Northern Arizona, which moved into second place ahead of No. 22 Mines, which is now third in the 6-team meet with 290.
 
The biggest highlight of the day came in the final event as Ben Sampson, Lane Austin, Mado Elkady and Felipe D'Orsi combined to win the 200-yard freestyle relay in one minute, 20.05 seconds, lowering the Maverick, El Pomar Natatorium and meet standard.  That time is also the best in Division II this year.
 
Sampson also posted a time of 20.10 seconds on the lead-off split, the second fastest time in the country.
 
In the morning preliminary session, Sampson had set a new meet record of 1:48.55 in the 200 IM, which with the altitude-adjustment gives him the national lead at 1:47.35.  He did not compete in the final of that event.  However, the Mavericks still went 1-2-3 in it as Matheus Laperriere (1:49.59), Zach Hartman (1:50.87) and Matt Barrett (1:51.73) all set NCAA provisional qualifying times as well.
 
Earlier, Dejan Urbanek set the 500 free meet record, touching in 4:28.65 to go more than three seconds faster than Sam Bryant's 2017 meet record of 4:31.88.  Urbanek also leads the country by more than four seconds with his converted time of 4:23.65, just off Bryant's Maverick record of 4:23.13.
 
Gavin Anderson also finished second in that event at 4:37.62 after going slightly faster (4:36.96) in the morning prelims to rank eighth in school history.  Meanwhile, Logan Ellis won the "B" final in an NCAA qualifying time of 4:38.33 while Jeremy Koch (4:40.67) and Austin Mondello (4:43.95) took fourth and sixth, respectively.
 
The Mavericks also had three NCAA qualifiers in the 50 free as Austin out-touched Elkady to claim the win.  Austin was clocked in 20.36 seconds while Elkady finished in 20.39.  Felipe D'Orsi finished fourth in 20.54, improving his standing on the NCAA qualification list.
 
Tanner Belliston was CMU's first event winner of the day as he scored 492.50 points in the preliminaries and 474.15 points in the finals of the 3-meter diving competition, held during the afternoon.  Both scores were well over the NCAA qualifying standard of 460 points.  Teammate Dylan Apicello finished second with 412.40 points.
 
The Maverick women also set two meet and two school records.  One of the meet records also came in the diving well as Jolynn Harris scored 475.55 points on 11 dives off the 1-meter to better the former meet mark of 466.50 points, set by Cassie Blakeman in 2016, while leading a 1-2-3 Maverick sweep.
 
Teammate Ali Lange was second with 451.20 points as she booked a trip to the NCAA Division II Championship pre-qualification meet as did freshman Kyra Apodaca, who finished third with 388.35 points after getting over the national qualifying standard with a score of 393.40 in the afternoon preliminaries.
 
Kelsea Wright and Lily Borgenheimer also set new CMU records in the first two swimming events of the night.
 
Wright blazed to a time of 5:00.78 to finish third in the 500 free behind two Northern Arizona swimmers.  Her mark converts to 4:55.78 with the altitude adjustment and will rank her second in Division II this year.
 
Wright's time was also 2.5 seconds quicker than the former CMU record of 4:58.28, set by Katerina Matoskova, who also set a personal best and NCAA "B" cut time of 5:01.97 (4:56.97-converted) time in Thursday's final.  Amelia Kinnard, who broke the 1,000 free school record on Wednesday, moved into the top 3 of CMU history as well as she finished the prelims in 5:03.25 (4:58.25-converted) before finishing sixth in the quick final at 5:04.23.
 
Borgenheimer then broke her own school record and a 6-year old meet record in the 200 IM, winning in 2:03.14 (2:01.94-coverted) to take the No. 2 spot on the national list.  Davy Brown also set a NCAA qualifying mark of 2:05.71 to finish second.
 
The Maverick women continued their winning ways in the 50 free as Julie Day swam to a NCAA provisional qualifying time of 23.80 seconds.  Logan Anderson and Izzy Powers tied for fourth in 24.25 seconds after Anderson had finished the prelims in 24.20.
 
After Harris' diving win, Day, Anderson, Powers and Ruby Bottai combined to take the 200 free relay in 1:34.48, just 0.04 off the meet record.
 
Friday's portion of the meet begins at 10 a.m. with preliminary round action in five different disciplines.  Diving will begin at 1 p.m. while an all-finals evening session will get underway at 5 p.m.