The ASU men’s dive team left the NCAA championships with both team and individual accolades.
“It was a very good week for our three divers,” ASU coach Mark Bradshaw said. “Everybody performed very well.”
The Sun Devils sent three divers to the meet, more than Bradshaw has ever taken the championship, and the depth of this ASU team was evident in the very first event.
In the 1-meter springboard event, the Sun Devils were the only school to qualify three divers for the finals. Juniors Cameron Bradshaw and Constantin Blaha were joined by sophomore Riley McCormick in the finals.
Blaha led the team in the 1-meter with a sixth place finish, while McCormick was right behind him and finished in eighth. Bradshaw, who was competing in the NCAA National Championships for the first time, finished 14th overall.
While Blaha’s sixth place finish was impressive on its own, he was able to improve upon his performance in the 3-meter event.
Blaha, the two-time Pac-10 3-meter champion, finished third in the nation in the 3-meter springboard.
While most championship performances are memorable to watch, Bradshaw particularly enjoyed watching Blaha compete.
“He really lit it up in the final,” Bradshaw said. “It was really fun to watch. It was the best I’d seen him dive in a final of a championship-style event.”
McCormick and Bradshaw were also competing in the event, but only McCormick, who finished 12th, was able to reach the finals.
Bradshaw and Blaha only competed in the two springboard events, but McCormick competed in the 10-meter platform event as well.
McCormick was the runner-up at the NCAA National Championships in the platform a year ago and had high expectations for this meet. But he was unable to live up to them.
With a score of 278.3, McCormick finished in 20th and was unable to advance out of the preliminary round.
“It was unfortunate; Riley (McCormick) had a pretty off-day for himself,” Bradshaw said. “Every very good diver has one of those now and then.”
While a strong performance by McCormick would have made the meet that much better for the Sun Devils, Bradshaw was still pleased with his team’s overall performance.
“Overall it was a good meet,” Bradshaw said. “The only thing missing was Riley (McCormick) not having his usual performance on the tower.”
Since no ASU swimmers qualified for the meet, it would have been impossible for ASU to win the team championship. But a Pac-10 team was able to take the title. The California Golden Bears won their first men’s swim and dive national championship in 31 years, beating out Texas by more than 20 points.
Reach the reporter at william.boor@asu.edu
