The Cerritos College Diving team ends the season with a couple of top 5 finishes in the South Coast Conference Diving Championships this past weekend.
The diving team earned 55 points that go toward the SCC Championships at Mount Sac. on April 17 and 18. Diving Coach Glen Myer is proud of the way his team performed.
“I knew we weren’t going to be the leaders. We have a new group of divers, ” he said. “So we set goals for ourselves and we definitely met those goals. We performed about as I expected.”
Diver Randy Baldwin placed third in conference and twelve in Southern California and enjoyed the event as a whole.
“Our conference didn’t have much competition, so it was kind of nice for us because weren’t amazing as well, ” he said. “We did our best and I’m proud of myself for just diving twice a week.”
While the competition went well for Baldwin, Richard Hyo Park ended up getting a concussion from the warm ups before his official event.
“On Friday morning with a long warmup and again he was trying to hit those dives and instead the pool was hitting him,” Myer said. “On the drive home the symptoms started to hit him and he couldn’t compete on Saturday because of the concussion.”
With the diving season now over, Myer still thinks the 55 points that the divers earned can end up being a difference maker when the tournament comes along.
“If we are trying to get second or third, it’s really going to keep whoever is fighting for fourth out of our hair,” he said. “It’s nothing to sneeze at, it’s a good chunk of change.”
Swim team head coach Joe Abing feels that the team has been training hard and is ready for the competition.
“Finishing with their best times and I feel confident that they are going to do that this week,” he said. “As long as they do their best, then everything will take care of itself from there.”
Abing feels that the team has confidence after coming off a first place finish from the Golden West Invitation that took place on Friday, April 4.
“We didn’t swim well as (far) as our times go at that meet,” he said. “The more important thing is for everyone to get their best times. If we do that, it will be a successful team effort.”
Baldwin, who is also a swimmer, stands by his coach’s thoughts and feels that the team has the what it takes to do well.
“Mt. SAC has a lot of good swimmers, but we are just trying to do our best and I think that we are going to take some first places and place a lot,” Baldwin said.
