ATLANTA – Sometimes, what separates a great from a good athlete is the ability to learn from a missed opportunity.

Moss Farms Diving Tigers coach John Fox said that’s what Carson Tyler did in just one day, and it made him a USA Diving Junior National medalist.

Tyler didn’t like how he dove in the semifinals of Saturday’s 14-15 Boys 3-meter semifinal, according to Fox. He received a total score of 394.75, eighth place by 0.85. Doing his eight-dive list, Tyler had four final dives with degrees of difficulty between 2.8 and 3, the 3 being a forward 2 1/2 somersault 1 twist pike. It was either feast or famine in the scoring, two 33.6s, a 61.5 and a 61.6.

“He knew he could have done better,” said Fox. “We look at that as an opportunity to improve. Sometimes it takes an athlete a long time to learn that.”

For Tyler, the learning process was quick, for the finals were on the same afternoon at the same Georgia Tech Aquatic Center. With a score of 434.55, Tyler won the third-place Bronze medal. All of his dives here were also 2.8 to three in DD. He received a 67.2 twice, one judge even giving him a 9 on the back 2 1/2 somersault tuck.

With scores like that, the last one of 44.8 had to be a bit of a letdown as Fox said at times Tyler was in the lead.

The first-place Gold medal went to Mile High Diving’s Quinn Henniger at 462.25 (though he did not get a 9 in the finals). He also won the 14-15 Boys platform on Thursday.

Saturday was the final day of the week-long Junior Nationals at Georgia Tech. It was the first and only day Sky Geovanni, fresh off winning platform at the AAU Nationals in San Antonio the week before, represented the Diving Tigers in the USA Diving meet.

In the 16-18 Boys platform semifinals, it was an 10-round event, and Geovanni fought all day to get into the top 12. That’s what’s needed to advance to the finals. He was 12th in the order of 25 divers, and his eighth-round dive got him into eighth place. When the round ended, though, he was 14th (325.65), but four points from the 11th-place spot.

In the ninth round, where he went up the 10-meter tower, he did not get back into the top 12, receiving a score of 39.8. With 402.3 overall, Geovanni placed 15th.

FRIDAY DIVING

When the weekend began in Atlanta, all three of Moss Farms’ three-event semifinalists were going for medals. Tyler, Bo Bridges (12-13 Boys) and Ruth Anne McCranie were all jumping off 1-meter springboards.

McCranie had to be one worn-out young lady, for Monday through Friday she had two preliminaries and three semifinal/final combinations. But she showed up and received 282.1 scoring for 7th place in the 12-13 Girls semifinals. That was 0.5 ahead of eighth place. Three of her eight dives were among the top 10 in scores with a 40.5 coming on the reverse dive pike. That was the third-best of the third round.

She carried over 177.3 into the finals and finished in ninth place at 279.45. Her inward 1 1/2 somersault tuck was the last dive out of three, and it scored 39.6, the fifth best of the final round.

Lily Witte of Legacy Diving won the Gold at 315.05.

Bridges was still getting his first taste of semifinal and final diving at the USA National level, and in the 1-meter semis his score was 267.35, 10th place by 0.55. His list was eight dives long, the last one getting him a score of 40.8. That was a forward 2 1/2 somersault tuck at 2.4 DD.

It was still 3-for-3 on the week for Bridges getting into the finals, as it was for McCranie and Tyler. He carried over 161.1 and had three dives ahead of him. Two of them scored fifth best out of the 12, with the high being 46.8 (forward 2 1/2 somersault tuck). He finished eighth overall at 294.45 while Maxwell Miller of The Woodlands (Texas) won his second Gold of USA Junior Nationals by 1.5.

And Tyler wasn’t far from Friday’s medal stand in 1-meter as he placed fourth in the finals. That was another improvement over the semifinals, where he came in sixth place at 359.45. This was a 9-dive event, and in one round he did a forward 1 1/2 somersault 1 twist free (2.2 DD). That got the third-best score of the round of 47.3.

With 180.3 going with him into the finals, Tyler did three of his next four dives to scores better than 50 … actually that was his last three as he started with 44.4, 10th best of the round. All four were 2.3 or better in DD. His final tally was 381.9.

And joining him in the semifinals and finals was fellow Diving Tiger Nolan Lewis, who was the best in the 1-meter preliminaries on Monday. With a total score of 354.85, he placed seventh (0.65 ahead of eighth place) to get into the finals. He did an inward 1 1/2 somersault pike on his ninth dive, and it received 50.4.

With 167.05 carried over into the finals, Lewis did two dives of 50-plus for the ninth-best out of 12, 356.45.

Tyler Downs of RipFest in Indiana won 14-15 Boys 1-meter at 443.7.