The Wildcats celebrate after winning the 400-yard freestyle relay. The victory Saturday night completed a sweep of all five relays at the meet.

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COLUMBUS, Ohio — The UA women's swimming team ended the greatest week in program history with an NCAA team championship.

The Arizona Wildcats captured the school's first swimming national title by winning all five relay events and breaking three American records along the way.

After winning the 400-yard medley and 200 free relays on Thursday and the 200 medley and 800 free relays on Friday, the Wildcats made a clean sweep in relays by winning the 400 free in an American record 3 minutes, 11.34 seconds in the final event Saturday night at Ohio State's McCorkle Aquatic Pavilion.

That performance served as an exclamation point as Arizona finished with 484 points. The Cats were second last year and in 2000 and 1998.

"This whole week has been so emotional," said Taylor Baughman, who swam the final leg of the 400 free relay that included Lacey Nymeyer, Anna Turner and Lara Jackson. "To end it on that, there's nothing sweeter than finishing it off the right way. Winning all five relays is definitely something we knew we could do.

"We're all pretty tired. There was definitely a lot of heart out there."

For most of the Wildcats' key performers, the road to winning the national title included a painful experience a year ago. Arizona held a 32-point lead heading into the final day of national competition but finished second behind Auburn.

That finish was on the Wildcats' minds as they built a 19-point lead on Thursday and extended it to more than 100-points heading into Saturday.

Auburn finished second (348) while Stanford was third (343). Arizona State finished 17th (59) of the 50 scoring teams.

"It's just a blessing to be a part of such a powerful group of women," said sophomore Annie Chandler. She placed eighth (2:10.64) in the 200 breaststroke Saturday after swimming on the 200 medley relay and placing third in the 100 breast on Friday. "We've been thinking about Day 3 for 365 days. I was an inexperienced freshman last year and for me it was a shocker (when we didn't win). I don't think any of us can forget that heartsick feeling. We would have done anything to avoid that. To blow things out of the water this year is what we were looking for."

The meet was bittersweet for Nymeyer, the Mountain View High grad.

After winning the 200 freestyle and swimming on the first-place 200 free relay a year ago, the senior placed second on Friday in the 200 free.

She bounced back to win the 100 free Saturday night in a pool-record 47.50.

"It's great to win an individual national championship on the same night that you win a team national championship," Nymeyer said. "I was just going to go for it. I didn't really care what the rest of the field was doing. This is so special being a part of this. Being a senior and seeing the four years leading up to it, seeing the steps we've made, it's so special in my last year that we won our first championship."

Since coach Frank Busch took over the program in 1989, his teams have placed in the top 10 each of the past 17 seasons, including three with runner-up finishes.

Also reaching the awards podium last night were Caitlin Iversen, who was sixth in the 200 breast stroke (1:54.45) for the second year in a row, and Anna Turner in the 100 free (eighth, 48.57).

"We've never won (a championship) before, so this is pretty special," Busch said. "It's pretty exciting for the University of Arizona. I know how much it means, and it means a lot. They wanted this more than anything. This is a very special group of young ladies."