Photo Courtesy of Jacob Funk

TUCSON, Ariz. – The Northern Arizona divers wrapped up their weekend at the Arizona Wildcat Diving Invitational with their first appearance on the platform tower this season on Sunday. Junior Chelsea Jackson led the Lumberjacks with a ninth-place finish and was one of three divers in the top 20, concluding a successful trip to Tucson this weekend.

"The other divers were doing harder dives than we were because we don't dive off platform often enough, but it was a great performance from all of our divers today," said diving coach Nikki Huffman. "There are areas that we want to improve on, but we've been working really hard and everyone did a great job all weekend."

Jackson notched her third top 10 finish of the weekend as she posted a score of 194.70, good for ninth overall coupled with a fourth-place finish on 3-meter and sixth-place finish on 1-meter during the first two days. She also improved her platform finish from a year ago at the Wildcat Diving Invite by a spot after placing 10th last season.

Jackson wasn't the only returning Lumberjack diver to improve their standings on platform from last year's meet as both sophomore Alexa Geiger and junior Carlye Townsend performed well on Sunday. Geiger made huge leaps finishing 16th overall with a score of 171.10, besting last year's finish by 19 spots and her score increased by nearly 70 points. Townsend was two spots behind Geiger in 18th with a score of 161.60. Last season, Townsend finished in a tie for 23rd.

Freshmen Emma Simmonds and Alyssa Loeffelman placed 24th and 29th respectively in their first collegiate competition on platform. Simmonds posted a score of 144.80 and Loeffelman recorded a 138.65.

The divers will reunite with the NAU swimmers next on Saturday, Dec. 6 in the team's first home dual meet of the season. The Lumberjacks will host New Mexico State in the Wall Aquatic Center at 11 a.m.