The Virginia Cavaliers are getting some reinforcements at NCAAs, with two more divers joining the qualifying lists on the final night of the 2016 Zone A Championships.
Virginia already had Rebecca Corbett qualified after the first night, and she earned another qualifying spot with a 6th place finish on platform. But Kylie Towbin (3rd) and Corey Johnson (4th) are also in on the women’s side through platform to bring UVA’s diving roster to three.
Virginia should be in the hunt for a top-5 finish as a team, especially if their diving corps can chip in with an already-stellar swimming roster.
Harvard’s Jing Leung won the women’s event, giving the Crimson their first diving qualifier. Meanwhile Logan Stevens won the men’s platform for Virginia Tech, which means the H2Okies will have 4 different divers at nationals.
The final qualifying lists are below. 5 women and 4 men will earn NCAA reimbursement status, and the rest of the names are eligible to compete at NCAAs on their school’s dime.*
*The full NCAA selection procedures are spelled out at the bottom of this story.
| Priority | Finisher | Women | Men |
| 1 | 3-meter Champ | Addison Walkowiak, RUT | Hector Garcia, PSU |
| 2 | 1-meter Champ | Olivia Lehman, JMU | |
| 3 | Platform Champ | Jing Leung, HARV | Logan Stevens, VT |
| 4 | 3-meter 2nd | Ashlynn Peters, VT | John Crow, PSU |
| 5 | 1-meter 2nd | Dominic Giordano, PITT | |
| 6 | Platform 2nd | ||
| 7 | 3-meter 3rd | Meme Sharp, PITT | Mauro Silva, VT |
| 8 | 1-meter 3rd | Alyssa Black, RUT | Benjamin Schiesl, VT |
| 9 | Platform 3rd | Kylie Towbin, UVA | Jayden Pantel, COL |
| 10 | 3-meter 4th | Rebecca Corbett, UVA | Eduardo Castro, VT |
| 11 | 1-meter 4th | Logan Knauss, PSU | |
| 12 | Platform 4th | Corey Johnson, UVA | Joseph Kaszubowski, NAVY |
| 13 | 3-meter 5th | ||
| 14 | 1-meter 5th | — | |
| 15 | Platform 5th | Leah Piemonte, VT | — |
| 16 | 3-meter 6th | Alexandra Butera, UCONN | — |
| 17 | 1-meter 6th | — | — |
| 18 | Platform 6th | — |
(Athletes in bold are locked in for NCAA reimbursement. Athletes who have doubled up on qualifying spots are noted with a line through their lower priority slot.)
NCAA ZONE QUALIFYING PROCEDURES
From our refresher post, which you can find here.
Divers qualify for the NCAA Championships through Zone Meets spread across the country. Each zone earns a set number of NCAA qualifying spots based on the performances of that Zone at NCAAs in the past.
Here are the qualifying spots for each event in each zone:
Women
| 1M | 3M | PLATFORM | |
| Zone A | 5 | 6 | 6 |
| Zone B | 9 | 8 | 7 |
| Zone C | 12 | 7 | 10 |
| Zone D | 6 | 9 | 9 |
| Zone E | 9 | 11 | 9 |
Men
| 1M | 3M | PLATFORM | |
| Zone A | 4 | 5 | 4 |
| Zone B | 10 | 10 | 8 |
| Zone C | 7 | 9 | 8 |
| Zone D | 7 | 7 | 8 |
| Zone E | 8 | 5 | 8 |
Any diver who finishes within the qualifying spots for their zone earns eligibility for the NCAA Championships. Any diver who earns eligibility in one event can compete in any of the other two events at NCAAs, provided they finished inside the top 12 in their zone in that event.
The final wrinkle is a new rule from last season that makes a distinction between “eligible” athletes and “reimbursed” athletes. The NCAA loosened its rules last season to allow more divers into the meet, but divers qualifying under the new rules do not recieve reimbursement from the NCAA for their travel, lodging and meet expenses – that means it’s up to the individual school to decide if they will foot the bill themselves to allow the diver to compete at NCAAs.
Each zone has a set number of reimbursement spots between the three events combined:
| WOMEN | MEN | |
| Zone A | 5 | 4 |
| Zone B | 8 | 9 |
| Zone C | 11 | 8 |
| Zone D | 7 | 8 |
| Zone E | 10 | 6 |
The spots are determined by a priority chart. The winners of each event have first priority, starting with the 3-meter champ, then the 1-meter champ, then the platform champ. After that, the runners-up are added in the same order. If an athlete wins both 1-meter and 3-meter, they still only take one reimbursement slot, meaning the NCAA will keep adding rows of this chart until the reimbursement quota for that zone is met.