The Florida men’s and women’s diving teams wrapped up action at the Auburn Invitational on Tuesday afternoon, finishing in fourth and third place, respectively, in the three-day competition.
The event featured UF, Auburn, Alabama, LSU, South Carolina, and Tennessee.
The Gators women’s team finished behind Tennessee and LSU with 79 points. Standouts from the event included sophomore Brooke Madden, who placed second in the 3-meter dive and fourth in the 1-meter dive, and freshman Emma Whitner, who led her team with an eighth-place finish in the platform dive.
On the men’s side, Florida recorded 32 points, finishing behind LSU, Auburn and Alabama. Redshirt senior Dalton Goss was the only Gator to record a top-10 finish in any event, placing ninth in the platform dive on Tuesday.
Sophomore Alex Farrow sat near the bottom of the pack, placing 13th in the 3-meter dive, 13th in the platform dive and 14th in the 1-meter dive.
"Even though I think we can dive much better than we did today, I think how we respond and learn from this meet will determine how successful the meet was for us,” diving coach Bryan Gillooly said in a release. “We continued to train and make changes throughout the competition and our focus remains on the SEC and NCAA Championships.”
Despite some of the low finishes amongst both teams, Gillooly said that staying calm and composed was going to be important as the season progresses.
“Confidence will be the key to our success,”Gillooly said. “And hopefully this experience will add to our confidence level moving forward."
Both the men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams will face off against in-state rival Florida State at the O’Connell Center on Jan. 5 before hosting Florida Atlantic on Jan. 6.
Contact River Wells at rwells@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @riverhwells.
The Florida men's and women's swimming and diving times compete in Austin, Texas, this weekend in an event hosted by the Texas Longhorns. The UF men enter the meet ranked No. 8, while the women have a national rank of No. 19.
