Kentucky Hosts 2021 NCAA Zone C Diving Championships

LEXINGTON, Ky. – The University of Kentucky men’s and women’s diving program will host the 2021 NCAA Zone C Diving Championships at the Lancaster Aquatic Center March 7-9. The Zone C Championship is the lone opportunity for divers to compete for entries at the 2021 NCAA Men’s and Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships, while swimmers earned qualifying cuts throughout the year. 

 

The United States is sectioned into five zones. UK is in Zone C, which includes Division I programs from Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Ohio. Divers competing this weekend had to meet preset standards at a meet throughout the season in order to qualify for the zone championships. A diver could have met a standard on one, two or all three disciplines – 1-meter springboard, 3-meter springboard and/or platform. 

 

The UK divers competing at the Zone C Championships are as follows: 

 

Sam Duncan (1M, 3M) 

Kyndal Knight (1M, 3M, PL) 

Chase Lane (1M, 3M, PL) 

Rodrigo Romero (1M) 

Danny Zhang (1M, 3M, PL) 

  

At the zone championships, the top-18 finalists from the preliminary round will advance to the final round. At the conclusion of the final round per discipline, tabulators will compile scores from the preliminary round and the final round to determine the divers that will earn bids to the NCAA Championships. Those automatic qualifying spots are as follows: 

 

1-Meter – Women: 7; Men: 7 

3-Meter – Women: 6; Men: 7 

Platform – Women: 10; Men: 10 

 

If a diver auto qualifies for the NCAA Championships in one or more events at the Zone C Championships, he or she will be allowed to optionally enter any other event(s) at the national meet, provided that the diver finished in the top 12 in the additional event at the same zone meet. 

  

This weekend’s schedule is as follows: 

 

Sunday, March 7	10:30 a.m. ET	Women’s 1M  Men’s 3M
Monday, March 8	10:30 a.m. ET	Women’s 3M  Men’s PL
Tuesday, March 9	10:30 a.m. ET	Women’s PL  Men’s 1M

 

Events will run straight through with a 15-minute break between the end of preliminaries and the beginning of the finals.  

 

Fourteen swimmers from the UK women’s swimming and diving team have already been invited to compete at the national meet – the zone championship is the final opportunity to qualify athletes for the NCAA Championships. The committee will release the invited male swimmers this coming week. Divers who qualify this weekend will join the UK swimmers at the national meet. 

 

The 2021 NCAA Women’s Swimming and Diving Championships will commence March 17-20, while the 2021 NCAA Men’s Swimming and Diving Championships resumes March 24-27, both at the Greensboro Aquatic Center in Greensboro, North Carolina. 

 

For the latest on the Kentucky swimming and diving program, follow @UKSwimDive on Twitter and on Instagram, on Facebook and on the web at UKathletics.com.