College Station, TX - Tennessee claimed third-place at the NCAA Swimming and Diving Championships Saturday in College Station, Texas. The finish is the Volunteers' best under coach John Trembley and the program's best since the 1978 squad won the national title.

Trembley has lead the Vols to 12 Top 10 finishes in his 13 seasons at the helm and five Top 5 finishes. The Volunteers finished with a third-place total of 330.5 points. Texas won the team title with 597.5 while Stanford was second with 457.5 points. Southern California was fourth (299) and Florida rounded out the top five (265).

The Volunteers scored in three individual events and the 400 freestyle relay on Saturday. With Tennessee's third-place finish already secure, UT concluded the meet by finishing fourth in the 400 freestyle relay with a school record time. Chris Hussey, Jeremy McDonnell, Renato Gueraldi and Michael Gilliam reached the wall in a time of 2:53.67 to better UT's previous best of 2:53.95 set by the 1996 foursome of Ricky Busquets, Devin Peitrzak, Shawn McNew and Jon McGowen. The record is the fifth school record set by the Vols during the meet and the fourth relay school record.

Senior diver Gabi Chereches produced the top individual finish of the evening with a fourth-place finish in the platform diving event. The Houston, Texas native scored 561 points and was less than two points out of third place. Chereches produced three top-eight finishes on the weekend and finishes his career with nine All-America honors

Gilliam, who won the 100 back title and finished sixth in the 50 freestyle, also claimed his third top-eight performance of the meet with a seventh-place time of 43.62 in the 100 freestyle. Gilliam earned seven All-America honors at the meet, running his career total to 16.

A pair of Vols scored in the 200 breaststroke. Freshman Andrew Bree finished eighth with a time of 1:57.57in the championship finals while junior Chris Stewart won the consolation finals with a time of 1:58.18. Bree, who competed in the 200 breaststroke for Ireland at the Olympics, clocked a career-best time of 1:56.81 in the prelims to qualify for the finals. Stewart was the last qualifier for the consolation finals but was able to win the race.

For the weekend, Tennessee captured one NCAA gold medal, two NCAA silver medals and a pair of NCAA bronze medals. The Volunteers place 16 competitors in championship finals and an additional four in the consolation finals.