Walkersville Divers Compete in the Frederick County Competition
by Claire Owen
Thursday night at Walkersville High Pool, the 2017 Diving Champions took place at 6 pm.
Walkersville Diving team has two girls, Junior Julia Mattis and Junior Julia O’Connell. The power team of Julia’s dove in their events last night against some of the best divers in the county. Tuscarora, Frederick, Oakdale, and of course the Lion’s swim teams all came out to support their divers. Some even showed up with painted stomachs spelling out names!
Diver Junior Julia Mattis commented that it was her, “worst meet ever but I was out for back injuries most of the season so I’m alright with that.” Mattis also uneasily went on to say that she’s never gotten a score of 4 ½ before. Despite those things Mattis said that her favorite dive was “Inward because it’s the only one that feels natural [to me]”.
Lions other diver, Junior Julia O’Connell seemed to have similar feelings about the night. She was nervous about the night, and commented that the meet went “not good honestly”. O’Connell also confessed about her season saying it was, “not that great, I didn’t really put effort I think into my dives”. Although O’Connell also said “My favorite dive was probably my last one which was the straight somersault”.
The winners of the evening were girls, Melissa Novak from Oakdale High and boys, Joshua Crocker from Tuscarora High.
Even though Mattis and O’Connell fel as they didn’t do their best, other people thought differently. Junior Mikaela Miller who is on the swim team at WHS commented that, “I think our divers have greatly improved through the season and I could tell by the judges points rising every meet. I can tell they work hard at what they do and they really help advance our team throughout the season. Their points sometimes differ between first and second so they really help us in competition”.
As the season comes to the end for diving, it also does for swimming too. Tomorrow, February 10th is the Counties Championship for WHS’s Swim Team.
