March 18, 2010
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Taryn Zack became an All-American for the third time in her career Thursday night as she finished seventh in the 1-meter diving final at the NCAA Women’s Swimming & Diving Championships.
“I was happy with the way it went,” Zack said. “I was a little disappointed with my third dive. But I hit some good objectives that (coach) Todd Sherritt set for me. I hit my last three dives pretty well, and I was able to move up to seventh. One-meter is kind of a warm-up for the 3-meter, so I’m really looking forward to tomorrow.”
Zack, a junior from Stony Plain, Alberta, Canada, scored 311.35 in the six-dive final to take seventh place, the highest finish of her career at the NCAA Championships, besting an 11-place showing on the 1-meter board in 2008. She got off to a good start with eights across the board on her first dive, then struggled a bit on her next two attempts, the second being a reverse 1 ½ that has been troublesome in recent meets. But she rebounded in a big way by nailing her final three dives – earning scores of 59.80 on both of her twisters – to move up to seventh place. Earlier in the day, Zack finished sixth in preliminaries with a score of 304.65.
“She was very impressive today,” South Carolina diving coach Todd Sherritt said. “She’s been impressive the whole time, very cool and relaxed. But we did what we wanted to, and we’re peaking here at NCAAs. This is the strongest diving field that there’s been in a long time; a very intense, strong field. I’m really happy with the way things turned out today. If she had hit her back and gainer, I think we’d have had her up around third or fourth. But tomorrow is much more important because the 3-meter is where she can be at her best.”
Houston’s Anastasia Pozdniakova won the 1-meter title with an NCAA Championships record score of 356.20. Minnesota’s Kelci Bryant was second (352.65) and Texas A&M’s Jaele Patrick finished third (340.60). Zack was the only diver from a Southeastern Conference school that advanced to the championship final. Georgia’s Hannah Moore and Auburn’s Anna Aguero finished 14th and 15th, respectively, in the consolation final.
Zack will return to the boards for the final time in the 2009-10 college season on Friday afternoon as preliminaries for the 3-meter event get underway at 1:30 p.m. Finals are set to begin at 7 p.m. at the Boilermaker Aquatic Center on the campus of Purdue University. Live results and video are available through NCAA.com.
