Freece Places 9th in 3-Meter Diving at NCAA Zone Championships

Liberty freshman Maddie Freece finished ninth in three-meter diving on day two of the NCAA Division I Women's Diving Zone A Championships, Friday at the Greensboro Aquatic Center in Greensboro, N.C.

Freece placed ninth overall with a 12-dive combined score of 535.00, while junior Lauren Chennault finished 22^nd with 223.30 points from prelims.  

Liberty's Top Performers
• Fr. Maddie Freece – Three-meter diving (12) – 535.00 (13^th place overall)
• Jr. Lauren Chennault – Three-meter diving (6) – 223.30 (22^nd place overall)

Notable
• During this week's three-day meet, the top 18 from morning prelims each day qualify for evening finals. The top five combined scores from prelims and finals in three-meter diving qualified for the 2021 NCAA Division I Women's Swimming & Diving Championships.

• Today's event featured 26 divers, representing schools from Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland and Massachusetts.

• Jocelyn Porter of Virginia won the three-meter Zone Diving Championship, scoring 619.75 points. Pitt's Amy Read earned the fifth and final qualification for nationals with her score of 564.85.

• Freece finished morning prelims in ninth place with 271.50 points, and remained in ninth place at the end of finals.   

Historically Speaking
• Freece is the first Lady Flame to finish in the top 10 in an event at NCAA Zone Championships in program history.  

• This was the first time in program history that a Liberty diver had qualified for finals at NCAA Zone Diving Championships on three-meter springboard.

• Freece is the fourth Liberty freshman in program history to compete in three-meter diving at NCAA Zone Championships, after Chennault, Abigail Egolf-Jensen and Olivia Robinson in 2019.  

• This is the third straight NCAA postseason appearance for Liberty's divers.

Up Next
Liberty will have one representative at the 2021 NCAA Division I Women's Swimming & Diving Championship, next Wednesday through Saturday at Greensboro Aquatic Center in Greensboro, N.C. Payton Keiner will compete in the 100 backstroke and 200 backstroke next week.