March 4, 2007

AUSTIN, Texas - Missouri sophomore diver Kendra Melnychuk needed to win Sunday's platform competition at the NCAA Zone D Diving to advance to next weekend's NCAA Championship. And that's exactly what she did on her strongest event of the weekend.

Thanks to a prelims score of 267.95, she cruised in the finals and won the tower portion of the event with a total score of 497.00 to join six other divers from the competition as qualifiers into next weekend's event, March 8-10 in Minneapolis, Minn.

She performed solidly in the finals and ended with the highest-scoring dive of the day - a 63.00 that earned 7 1/2s and two eights from the judges.

She is the second Mizzou diver in the last three years to qualify for the NCAA Championships, joining Nicole Frazier in 2005. She will also join Jill Granger as Missouri entrants in the championships.

Both MU athletes will practice on Monday at the Mizzou Aquatic Center and depart on Tuesday morning with coaches Brian Hoffer and James Sweeney.

Senior Kim Massaro saw her Mizzou career come to a close with a tenth-place finish.

In the men's portion of the event, Greg DeStephen finished third and David Boyko was seventh.