Arceri Wins Suffolk Diving Crown
Molly Arceri won the Section XI 1-meter diving championship last weekend at Suffolk Community College- West in Brentwood. It was the Huntington junior's second consecutive county crown.
"Molly Arceri did a great job once again, finishing in first place at the league championships and first at the county championships," said Christopher Helmke, Huntington's head coach. "Overall, she has had a great season and continues to be a vital asset to this team."
Arceri is the only female diver from Suffolk to qualify for this weekend's state championships in Buffalo. The teenager set a new Blue Devil diving record in the process.
Sixteen divers advanced to Saturday morning's Suffolk finals. Arceri easily outdistanced Smithtown's Colleen Gallaher, who finished second. Half Hollow Hills' Nicole Drury and Carly Rosen placed third and fourth, respectively.
"Molly Arceri proved again without a doubt she is the number one diver in Suffolk," said Meg McConnell, Huntignton's assistant coach who works with the team's divers. "She went into the meet relaxed and ready. Her high confidence with each of her dives, combined with the comfort level of returning to the same pool where she won counties last year, definitely helped her to succeed."
Throughout the regular season schedule, Arceri made a habit of using her "harder" dives in order to keep them fresh and to make sure he could execute them without any problems. She breezed to victories in every dual meet. She handily won the league crown, but wasn't entirely happy with her performance, further fueling her quest for the county title.
"In practice we continued working every dive, favorites and non-favorites equally to keep them each fresh," McConnell said. "At our practice the night before the state qualifier, we agreed she was fully prepared and ready to shine. Molly had to simply remember to enjoy the meet and make her dives beautiful."
The county meet utilizes an electronic scoring system to post scores, so the crowd knew Arceri was leading the diving competition throughout the second half of the event. "This helped Molly keep her focus strong yet she still cheered on her fellow competitors," McConnell said.
With two dives left Arceri needed less than 23 points to qualify for the state meet. Her tenth dive earned her 42.55 points, surpassing her 2009 county championship score of 411.75. As the junior hit her last dive to rousing cheers from the crowd, she clinched not only her second Suffolk crown, but another Blue Devil team record with an 11-dive score of 450.60.
"Although diving is quite an individual event, those who compete in Suffolk tend to be very friendly and supportive of one another and Molly truly embraces that spirit," McConnell said. But, this weekend in Buffalo, Arceri will be all business and she seeks to bring home an All-State medal.