MOULTRIE – Rain or no rain, everything’s been pressing forward business as usual the past two days at the Moose Moss Aquatic Center. And if lightning stays out of the area, this looks to be a major week for the Moss Farms Diving Tigers, host of the 2017 USA Diving Zone B Preliminaries.

This competition which begins this morning (Wednesday) and runs through Sunday is the final qualifying step for the USA Diving national championships. That’s the meet held one year ago in Moultrie and for 2017 takes place in Columbus, Ohio. Some Diving Tigers are already in the national field based on performances earlier in the year, and what happens in Zone B could mean the difference between the national preliminaries and going straight to the semifinals.

Tigers head coach Chris Heaton first gave out compliments to the parents involved with the team for setting things up at the diving well and welcoming in the 200-plus divers from points all over the southeast.

“Weather aside, no problems,” said Heaton. “It’s been smooth as we welcomed people to Moultrie. It’s been a good job with support from our parents. They always do a phenomenal job showing southern hospitality, making sure everything’s done right. We have a good parent base for that.”

Already this season, Heaton raved about the progress of Diving Tigers all up and down the list from youngest to oldest. The team already this month hosted the Moose Moss Invitational and dominated the score sheets. Back in the spring, divers won seven events at the YMCA Nationals  in Florida to qualify for USA nationals.

Heaton said they did some “mock meets” the past couple of weeks as a means of preparing for Zone B.

“The kids are just blowing it out of the water,” he said. “We’re very excited about this week. We could probably be taking the biggest national team up to Columbus. (Assistant coach) John (Fox) and I are really thrilled with the work they put in.”

To recap, Ruth Anne McCranie at 12-13 1- and 3-meter is a national qualifier, as is Jet Giovanni in all three 11 & under dives, Nolan Lewis in 14-15 platform and Johanna Holloway in 3-meter 16-18. So even they have other dives for which to qualify this week, and in all Moss Farms has 21 divers competing this week. This is one of six Zone qualifiers taking place across the country.

“If they are top thee at the Zone, they automatically go to (national) semifinals,” said Heaton. “The 11 & under had some restructuring at the convention this year, so they will go to prelims. Every other age group, if you get top three you go straight to semifinals.”

With the new year, not only do divers like McCranie advance up the age ladder (she swept her events in 11 & under at last year’s Zone B meet in Texas), but some new names emerge on the roster and display potential to be future champions. Some other established names include Carson Tyler, Chase Lane and Maggie Merriman, who like Holloway joined the Diving Tigers from Florida after competing at last year’s Moultrie nationals.

“Sky Giovanni, who moved here last year from Ft. Lauderdale, has been doing a really good job the last couple of weeks as far as training,” said Heaton. “We’re excited to see what he can do. I don’t know if he’ll be quite in the top three, but he’s put in some great work. We could be hearing his name quite a bit more.

“Jet is in the top of his age group, so we’re expecting big things out of Jet. Bo (Bridges) has been looking pretty good. If she’s on her ‘A’ game, Emily Ann Wolfson could do a good job this week. For her it’s going to be consistency, if she can do (her dives) back-to-back-to-back.”

A diver like Jewelia (pronounced like Julia) Chambers this year moved up to the Junior Olympic squad after a year-and-a-half in the program.

“She’s a clean diver, real sharp,” said Heaton. “Her entries are great. She could be a really good diver here in the future.”

A-year-and-a-half is also the length of time that Heaton and Fox arrived in Moultrie to run the storied Moss Farms program.

“We’re starting to see a lot of fruits from the changes we made,” said Heaton. “The honeymoon season’s over. We have the direction. We want the kids know exactly the vision John and I have painted. We’re continuing to see more success.”