There’s pressure. Megan McIntyre feels it every time she steps on the diving board. It’s been true all season, and it will be true again tomorrow at sectionals.
The girls diving team lost two of their more experienced divers: two-time state champion Mia Prusiecki and Molly McIntyre. This season, it is ultimately up to junior Megan McIntyre to represent Center Grove.
“The loss of Mia and my sister [Molly] alters the way I practice and perform because I have to fill both of their places so that the team is still on top,” Megan said. “I have felt more pressure to do well in all the meets because Mia would always be there to win and now she is gone so I have to win.”
Prusiecki graduated a semester early to start her diving career at Ohio State, but having Prusiecki by her side last season allowed Megan, who has only been diving for three years, to watch and learn from the best diver in school history.
“I’ve learned that you have to be confident when you get on the board because the judges can tell if you’re not,” Megan said. “I make sure to look at the judges and not straight ahead.”
Along with Megan putting pressure on herself to perform well for her team, she also has competition to worry about from other schools in the sectional. With ten divers competing in the sectional, only the top four advance to regionals.
“My biggest competition is Camy Quiggins from Franklin Community and Ella Taylor from Indian Creek,” McIntyre said. “They are both seniors and we have been diving together for the past 3 years. Both girls are in my sectional so it makes for some good competition.”
In meets, all divers get eleven dives, and the number of rotations, twists and the diver’s body position in the air all factor into the maximum score it receives. Megan realized that certain dives and techniques appeal more to the judges than what she was doing earlier in the season.
“There is a degree of difficulty in each dive,” Megan said. “So the harder the dive is, the more you will score. I have been working on upgrading my dives throughout the season, and right now I do a front two and a half. I changed a lot of my dives from a tuck position to a pike position so the difficulty is higher for sectionals.”
Through it all, having to adjust to the idea of practicing alone and having such big shoes to fill has been Megan’s main struggle.
“It’s definitely a lot of pressure since Mia is really good,” Megan said. “It used to be the three of us, but now it is just me, so now I have started practicing even more.”
