The Princeton University aquawomen held off a strong challenge from Pitt Panthers Saturday night at Pittsburgh's Trees Pool to recapture first-place honors in the Eastern AIAW Swimming and Diving Championships with 793 points.

Pitt finished second with 771 points. Penn State was third with 599, and the Harvard copped ninth with 192 points--four spots higher than last year's 13th place finish.

Although the meet was plagued with a plethora of problems--wrong seeding of events, miscopied scores in the diving, and an overabundance of false starts, to name a few of them--many swimmers overcame the difficulties to set new meet and pool records and qualify for the National AIAW Championships to be held in two weeks at the University of South Carolina.

The amazing Maureen Gildea Comeback Story continued over the weekend as the sophomore miler chopped another nine seconds off her 1000-yd. split in the 1650 freestyle to set a new team record and become the only Crimson swimmer to qualify for the AIAWs.

Swimming as the fifth seed in the finals of the mile, Gildea took her first 500-yds. out in a fast 5:06 and then hung on to finish fourth with a 17:11 despite the fact that her right kneecap popped out of joint at the 800-yd. mark.

"It hurt like heck and I was dying to get out, but I decided to finish anyway," Gildea said yesterday about the race.

Versatile yardling Debbie Zimic also swam well Saturday night, moving from eighth place to fifth in the finals of the 100-yd. individual medley with a seasonbest clocking of 1:01.3.

Fellow freshman Jeanne Floyd turned in solid performances over the weekend, including a 55.4 showing in the 100-yd. free and a 13th-place finish in the 1650 with an 18:10.

Hampered by the absence of coach John Walker--who traveled with the men's squad to Dartmouth for its Easterns--the best finishes divers Pam Stone and Adriana Holy could muster in the threemeter contest were 12th and 14th, respectively.

Head swim coach Vicki Hays said yesterday she was pleased with the way the season finished for the team.

"In terms of organization, atmosphere and competition, the Ivy League Championships two weeks ago was a much better meet," Hays said. "Next year I think we'll use the Ivies instead to qualify more of our swimmers for the AIAWs."