March 13, 2009

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Navy's Jon Galinski (Sr., Phoenix, Md.) and Olaf Olson (So., Bainbridge Island, Wash.) placed 13th and 14th, respectively, in the one-meter springboard event Friday on the opening day of the NCAA Zone `A' Diving Championship in Buffalo, N.Y.

"Both Jon and Olaf had some extremely good dives today, but they also had some misses on dives that they normally hit," said Navy diving coach Joe Suriano. "It was a good first day, though, and we all are looking forward to Saturday's three-meter competition."

Olson totaled 262.35 points to place 13th during the preliminary round of diving, while Galinski placed 18th with 253.85 points. Only the top-18 divers (out of the 30 overall competitors) in the first session of the day advanced to the finals.

Galinski would have a much better finals session as his score of 287.75 points ranked 11th out of the 18 divers. Olson, meanwhile, tallied 274.90 points in the finals to post the 15th-best score of the session. Overall, Galinski accrued 539.60 points and Olson scored 537.25 points.

Pittsburgh's Alex Volovetski totaled 778.50 points on the day to win the one-meter competition and advance to the NCAA Championship that will be held March 26-28 in College Station, Texas.

Additionally for Navy, Ben Nicholas (Fr., Bothell, Wash.) totaled 234.05 points to place 27th in the preliminary round of diving.

The three-day meet continues Saturday with the three-meter springboard event before concluding Sunday with platform diving.