By Conor Nevins

As the Northeastern University women’s swimming and diving team continues to stack their already crowded trophy case with numerous awards and honors from this season — including a fifth straight America East championship — it seems fitting to single out the accomplishments of NU’s distinguished champion diver, junior Adela Gavozdea.

Gavozdea will compete in this year’s NCAA Diving Championships which takes place March 18-20 at Texas A’M. By sweeping the one-meter and three-meter diving events at this year’s America East Championships, and winning the platform event at the 2004 Zone A Diving Regional, Gavozdea earned a spot in this year’s NCAA Championships. It will be the second consecutive appearance for the junior diver.

Last year, she placed 16th in the platform dive, 33rd in the one-meter dive and 36th in the three-meter dive.

Her coach, Roy Coates, expects Gavozdea will improve on her performance from the previous year.

“Her best event is the platform by far,” he said. “I expect she’ll place better in that this year. I think she could place around twelfth.”

Practicing for her best dive is an event in itself for Gavozdea. Since the Northeastern swimming and diving facilities do not include the 10-meter diving platform that she will use at the NCAA Championships, Gavozdea and her coaches have been preparing for the contest using the Harvard and MIT facilities. Nonetheless, Gavozdea excels at the platform, which is regarded as diving’s most difficult event.

“Most divers won’t even go as high as the platform and it’s her best event,” Coates said. “I think it’s a testament to her mental toughness. The higher she goes, the better she gets.”

As the sole competitor representing Northeastern University in collegiate diving’s highest competition in its highest event, Gadvozdea will hope that statement holds true.