Show business may be in PU soph’s future
By: Justin Feil
In his two years away from Princeton University, Kent DeMond was a national level diver as well as a daredevil diver. Most importantly, he became an improved diver.
The Potomac, Md. resident was already a good enough diver to make the 2002 NCAA Championships as a freshman at Princeton. He came back this year to place 15th in the men’s platform and 31st in the men’s 1-meter springboard at the NCAAs in Minneapolis on Saturday. He was the lone Ivy League diver at nationals.
"The way it works, if you qualify in one you can do any of them," DeMond said. "I’m just not a good springboard diver, at least at that level. I just did it to compete and get some experience.
"I was focusing on the 10-meter competition. I was hoping for 10th. That’s what I placed after the optional dives. During the compulsory dives, my entries weren’t as good as they had to be and five guys passed me."
Still it was a vast improvement over his 22nd-place platform showing as a freshman. The PU sophomore improved immensely in his two years off while in training for and making the Olympic Trials, where he and partner Ray Vincent of University of Southern California finished seventh in the synchronized platform diving, a new event to the Athens Olympics last summer.
DeMond spent the rest of his summer working as a high-flying diver in Monticello, Ind. It’s something he’s considering for this summer along with the senior nationals.
"I might do diving shows, like shows at parks and events," DeMond said. "It’s more like high diving from about 70 feet and fire-diving. It’s a good fun way to make money. I did that last summer. It’s not so bad once you get used to it.
"I was just learning. It was pretty scary up there. Basically you do dives that are technically a lot easier. You always dive to your feet. You’d probably break your arms if you dove in straight."
His high-diving experience also paid off this season, particularly for his favorite platform event. It wasn’t so much technique that was helped as just making going off the 10-meter platform that much less intimidating.
"That’s best advantage that I got out of high diving," DeMond said. "For most people, 10 meters is pretty high up. After 70 feet, it’s not too bad."
DeMond has proven he can do plenty from 10 meters up before splashing into a pool of water. He scored 457.25 points in the NCAAs after winning the Zone ‘A’ Diving Championships to qualify for nationals. He won the regional qualifying platform meet with a score of 502.90, ahead of Pittsburgh’s Denis Nemtsanov, who scored 486.05.
"I was expecting to have a good chance to qualify in the 10-meter event," said DeMond, who noted scoring usually tightens up at nationals. "There was a good diver from Pittsburgh, who had a chance to win the qualifying meet. I was hoping I could beat him in the qualifying meet. I was expecting if had a good day diving I could go."
After going to his second nationals, DeMond feels more confident for what he hopes will be a third trip in three tries next year. He’ll rely on what he learned from Saturday’s competition to look to move up and hold on to a higher spot through the four compulsory dives after the six optional dives.
"I think it does help a lot," he said. "Being in the dual meets all year, you don’t see what everyone else in the country is doing. Going to nationals, I got to see the competition on a larger scale. It’s good motivation for the rest of the year and next season. I know what dives I need to do and how to do them to be competitive next year."
DeMond has steadily improved since switching from the gymnastics he practiced through middle school to diving as a high school freshman. He liked the strides he took in the three years from his freshman to sophomore seasons at Princeton.
"I was really happy with the season," DeMond said. "Dual meets have been great. I was glad I made it to nationals. I was pleased I made Top 16. That gave some points to Princeton. I got Princeton 33rd place."
DeMond would have liked to see the Tigers’ one-man team do even better. It will be his focus through the next year to make sure he does improve again.
"As far as platform, my main thing I need to improve on is my entry into the water," DeMond said. "Other divers seem to make cleaner entries. For springboard, I know I need to do harder dives. I just need to improve my entry for dives.
"That’s exactly what hurt me at nationals. I was diving, I thought, pretty straight in and pretty clean. There were some people just disappearing in the water. That’s what got them the 8s when I was getting 6.5s. That’s what made them jump ahead of me."
With each season, and each little bit of improvement he sees, Kent DeMond expects fewer people will be jumping ahead.

