LA MIRADA, CALIF.—The University of Hawai'i swimming and diving squad kicked off the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation with a strong start, taking first place in three separate relay events.

"This is the best start we've had to the meet in the past three years," said head coach Dan Schemmel. "Today was the first time the women won the 200 relay, and it tied our school record, as well as an MPSF record. The men's 200 medley was insane. It was 1.3 seconds faster than school the school record and .01 off the NCAA A cut. Both of the 800s were awesome, and we had one girl from each class on the relay which was pretty cool to see from a coaching standpoint. We are very proud of the men as that hasn't been a great relay for us in the past, but they did a superb job and did it with two freshmen."
 
The Rainbow Wahine notched first place victories in both the 800 freestyle relay and the 200 medley relay. The 800 team consisted of senior Silvija Djelic, junior Phoebe Hines, sophomore Anna Kotonen, and freshman Katie Strachan. The foursome beat their previous season-high time of 7:14.34 by clocking in at 7:13.59, nearly three seconds ahead of second place UC Santa Barbara.
 
In the 200, senior Kasey Schmidt joined up with a trio of sophomores in Karolina Hajkova, Kionna Clayton, and Lucia Lassman to tie the UH seed time of 1:38.35 for another first-place finish ahead of UCSB.
 
For the men, the 200 was their premier event of the day. Seniors Metin Aydin and Reed Wynn, paired with juniors Olli Kokko and Mateusz Chaba to touch the wall at 1:24.57. The mark was nearly three-second better than their seed time and placed them ahead of second place Pacific.
 
The Rainbow Wahine have a comfortable lead of 12 points over UC Santa Barbara, 80-68 at the first-place position, while the Rainbow Warriors are also sitting in first-place tied with UCSB at 72 points in the team rankings.
 
The MPSF Championships will continue tomorrow with coverage provided on HawaiiAthletics.com and on Twitter @HawaiiSwimDive.