Arceri Finishes Fourth in Suffolk Diving Championships

She is only an eighth grader, but Huntington’s Tricia Arceri is already making a big splash in the Suffolk girls’ swimming and diving community. The J. Taylor Finley Middle School eighth grader finished fourth in the 1-meter diving county finals last week at Hauppauge High School. She was the only eighth grader among the top 16 Suffolk divers.

Arceri’s sister, Molly won three Suffolk diving crowns and finished second in New York State for Huntington High School before accepting a scholarship to Towson University. Can Tricia follow in her older sister’s footsteps? While no one can possibly know for sure, the teenager has rapidly ascended into ranks of the county’s best divers.

Huntington finished 13th in the team standings out of the 26 schools competing in the Section XI championships. Coached by Chris Helmke and Meg McConnell, the Blue Devils were competitive in many of the 12 contested events.

Huntington senior Rachel Feltman finished 11th in the 1m diving competition. The teenager was eighth after the preliminaries and sixth after the semi-final round.

In other Blue Devil action:

·   Eighth grader Sigrid Cassell placed eighth in the 100-yard freestyle.

·   Freshman Noelle Harvey and sophomores Nina Cartwright, Hailey Bengston and Caroline McCartney teamed up to finish 12th in the 200-yard freestyle relay.

·   Cassell, McCartney, Harvey and sophomore Jessica Straub placed 10th in the 200-yard medley relay.

·   Cassell, McCartney, Harvey and Straub finished 12th in the 400-yard freestyle relay.

·   McCartney was 24th in the 100-yard fly.

·   Cassell finished 16th in the 100-yard backstroke.