Senior diver Kristen Davies’ career-best score of 339.65 in the finals of her last collegiate meet put her into position to win the national title for women’s diving on the platform dive this past Saturday at the NCAA Championships in College Station, Texas. Davies became the first diver to win a national championship at N.C. State and the first woman to win a national title in swimming or diving at State.

“It feels amazing being national champion. I couldn’t have finished in a better way. I was feeling good and confident going into the finals but it’s a matter of putting all five dives down, and I did it,” Davies said. “I knew I had the capability to do that but it’s a whole other thing doing it in a meet with all the pressure.”

Diving coach Jenny Johansen credits Davies’ championship to her hard work and determination she has put in this entire season.

“I’m extremely proud of her, she did an amazing job. She has been able to come into practice every day all year and put everything she had into it,” Johansen said. “She is an amazing competitor. Everything that she has done all year long, every practice, always doing everything she can, and always asking to do more really helped to pave the way and gave her the confidence to go out there and do it.”

Going into the finals, Davies seemed like a long shot to win it due to her being the last diver making it into the finals from the preliminaries earlier in the day, but Johansen knew if she was just able to hit all her dives then she had just as good as shot as anyone.

“She did really well in the prelims, she just missed one dive really badly, but the fact that she was still up there with one really rough dive, I knew she was diving great and she just needed to have all the dives together on one list to win it,” Johansen said. “We started at zero in the finals and that’s when she went out and did great.”

Being the last one into the finals didn’t intimidate Davies at all. She actually relished being in the underdog role and knew she had the opportunity to win it all.

“I missed that one dive in prelims, but I was still able to make it in, so the only [real] place I could go from eight is up, so I just wanted to give it all I had and hope for the best,” Davies said. “It was awesome coming from behind, being the underdog after the prelims, and to come back and win.”

Davies enjoys being the first ever women’s swimmer or diver to win a national title at State, but believes that she won’t be alone on that list for long.

“It’s really exciting, but I’m sure I won’t be the last one,” Davies said. “We have a lot of good girls coming in and it will just pave the way for our girls to move up in the conference and the NCAA.”