When looking at the score of one of the most recent swim and dive meets, it is easy to overlook one half of the team’s perofrmance. The final result says West Springfield won the meet 182-132, but that does not tell the whole story. The AHS dive team was able to notch their fifth win of the season and remain unbeaten on the year by beating the Spartans 19-10 in the dive portion of the meet.
“It’s not surprising that our dive team is undefeated,” said sophomore Patrick McCann. “The amount of talent that we have on the team this year is uncomparable to other teams.”
Led by senior captains Sean McKinney and Chris Fuller, McCann, and juniors Jordan Aman and Andrew Pack, the team looks to complete their second straight undefeated season with a win over West Potomac HS on Friday, Jan. 22 at Lee District RecCenter.
“We’ve got a really good chance at winning our last meet because West Potomac isn’t that good and we’re quite talented,” said Aman.
The team’s most impressive win this season had to be Dec. 18 against Woodson. The Cavaliers, a new addition to the Patriot District this year, was also undefeated and had not lost a boys dive meet in eight years. The Atoms were happy to hand them that loss, 18-11.
“Everyone came out, did their best and that’s why we came out victorious,” said McKinney. “We made the other coach practically cry, so that was good.”
“Eight years is a long time so it was good to prove that we were better than them,” said McCann.
McKinney, who has placed second in the state for the past three years, has already qualified for the regional meet by scoring 200 points in a single meet. The Atoms could potentially have two other regional qualifiers in McCann and Aman, pending the result of Friday’s meet against Lee, which was completed too late for this issue.
“I think we’ll definitely have three studs from the dive team in the regional meet by the end of the year,” said McCann.
Although the AHS swim and dive team probably will not make regionals as a full team, the divers will be sure to represent the Atoms well and complete their second straight undefeated season.
UPDATE: The Atoms dive team remained undefeated by defeating Lee on Jan. 15. In the meet, sophomore Patrick McCann and junior Jordan Aman qualified for the Regional Tournament.
