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NORTH DARTMOUTH, Mass. - Junior Kristine Trutor (Holden, Mass.) set three individual records and qualified provisionally for the NCAA Division III Championships to lead Keene State College to its third straight Little East Conference Women's Swimming and Diving Championship this afternoon at the Tripp Athletic Center on the campus of the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. The Owls set nine championship records and won each of the 14 swimming events to post a team score of 508 points to outdistance themselves from Eastern Connecticut State University (308) and Western Connecticut State University (266).

Keene State College raises the team championship trophy for the third straight season and sixth overall in the program's history. The Owls' captured the Little East Championship the first three years it was sponsored by the conference before the Corsairs claimed back-to-back titles in 2004 and 2005.

Head Coach Jack Fabian's charges set the tone early in the meet by breaking the 200-yard medley relay in the championships first event. Junior Alea Paddock (Newbury, N.H.), freshman Maureen O'Leary (Nashua, N.H.), classmate Jillian Whittaker (Gilford, N.H.) and Trutor combined to establish a new championship record with a time of 1:49.54.

Trutor dominated the backstroke event, breaking two of her own personal championship records in the process. She set a new standard in the 100-yard event with a time of 58.24, shattering the pervious mark set in 2006 (1:01.28). Trutor posted a time of 2:08.52 in the 200-yard backstroke to shave 6.47 seconds off the meet record. She also broke the two-year benchmark in the 100-yard butterfly, touching in at 58.57 seconds to best Meaghan Coache's time in 2006.

Whittaker made an immediate impact in Keene State's lineup, breaking three championship records. She became the first Little East Championship swimmer to break 25 seconds in the 50-yard freestyle, touching in at 24.92. Whittaker also claimed the 100-yard and 200-yard breaststroke events with a time of 1:08.50 and 2:30.74, respectively.

Junior Jackie Foster (Goffstown, N.H.) and Paddock also broke their own championship meet records set last season in the 200-yard freestyle (2:00.07) and 400-yard individual medley (4:39.01), respectively.

Western Connecticut sophomore Heather Bodington (Wethersfield, Conn.) won the 1-meter diving competition with 208.95 total points to edge University of Massachusetts Dartmouth sophomore Danielle Sanko (Leicester, Mass.). Sanko rebounded to capture the 3-meter competition with 204.10 total points. Keene State sophomore Rachel Battis (Beacon Falls, Conn.) earned second place with 173.20 points.
The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth (224) and Plymouth State University (219) completed the five-team overall standings.

          2008 Little East Conference Championship Team Standings