Rachel Mumma of the NC State swimming and diving team is taking on her final season with the Wolfpack and plans to continue the same success she’s had the past three years.
She has already seen great triumph as the year is heading toward a close. Not enough can be said about Mumma and the long hours she has put in and the heights to which she has gone to help put herself among the top.
The Harrisburg, Pennsylvania native started out swimming at the age of eight and continued through her middle school and high school years. She also played field hockey in addition to diving through her high school years. As a high school senior, Mumma won the state diving championship. Mumma joined the Wolfpack for the 2011-2012 season.
“I actually fell in love with the campus, and I felt right at home with the team on my recruiting trip,” Mumma said. “It just felt like a really good fit.”
In Mumma’s freshman year, she qualified for the NCAA Zone B Diving Championships on the one-meter and three-meter diving boards. She also recorded 11 top-five finishes. In her sophomore year, she led the team with a one-meter dive total of 319.85 from 11 dives. She posted a score of 311.90 in the three-meter, good for second on the team.
After sitting out her junior year due to redshirting, Mumma came back better than ever. She posted a score 318.45 on the one-meter dive to earn honorable mention All-America honors at the NCAA Championships. She broke the one-meter dive school-record in November at the Nike Cup. She broke it again in a dual-meet versus UNC-Chapel Hill in which she recorded a score of 332.32. For the NCAA Tournament that year, she qualified for the one and three meter dives. At the ACC Championship, she finished fourth in the one-meter and sixth on platform.
In one of Mumma’s favorite memories as a diver here at NC State, the women’s team took a trip to LSU when she was a sophomore. It was a chance for the team to train elsewhere and compete against LSU. Mumma describes this trip as being a great time spent with the team in Louisiana.
After finishing fourth in the one-meter competition at the USA Diving Winter National Championships, Mumma earned a spot on the USA Diving National Team for the 2015 University World Games held in South Korea. She not only got to represent NC State but also the USA.
“You have an immediate family joining the team,” Mumma explained. “Being able to meet different people all across the country and staying good friends with them is pretty neat. I’ve had friends that I was in club with, and we have stayed pretty good friends with, and they are now all across the country.”
According to Mumma the hard work starts every day with a practice at 6 a.m. and then afternoon practices that Mumma and the divers take on as well. Divers, like Mumma, participate in the one-meter, three-meter and platform dives.
The team competes two to three times a month during the regular season and will participate in two invitationals throughout the season. The NCAA tournament takes place in March.
During her 2015 season as a diver, Mumma earned multiple ACC Female Diver of the Week awards.
After traveling to Greensboro last week for the ACC Swimming and Diving Championship, Mumma added more successes to her resume. She won the gold medal for the one-meter dive the first day. This proved to be the first title of her career, and it is only fitting being that it is her last ACC Championship. This is the first for the Wolfpack’s diving program since 2010.
