USA Diving Championships: Bayleigh Cranford Wins Two Synchro Titles in First Two Days
Bayleigh Cranford opened the USA Diving Championships with a pair of synchro titles to start the competition.
Cranford teamed with Tyler Willis on the opening day of competition to post the highest score of three teams in the mixed platform synchro with a score of 312.06 on Friday. Cranford came back the next day at Auburn University to join Daryn Wright in women’s platform title.
Cranford and Wills also won this title in 2023. They bested Kaden Springfield and Sophia McAfee by 46 points for the title.
Cranford, who dives at Texas, and Purdue’s Wright scored 569.43 points over a pair of lists on Saturday. They were second to the duo of Anna Lemkin and Lanie Gutch after morning prelims and through three rounds of the finals, but Cranford and Wright used a fourth-round inward 3.5 tuck for 82.56 points that put them in control. Their final margin was 15 points over Gutch and Lemkin, who scored 554.40 points. Katerina Hoffman and Bailee Sturgill finished third with a score of 503.19.
The other final on Friday, the second night of nine at the national championships, was closer. Luke Hernandez and Kyndal Knight scored 284.10 points to win the mixed synchronized 3-meter. Hernandez was representing Duke Diving, while Knight is unattached after her career at the University of Kentucky. They managed to best Krysta Palmer and Jack Ryan by 1.38 points. Luke Sitz and Sophie Verzyl were third in the field of four pairings.
Ryan ended up rebounding with the win in the men’s 3-meter synchro on Saturday night. The Stanford diving teamed with Texas grad and Mission Viejo diver Grayson Campbell to score 782.19. That was nearly 80 points ahead of the total of Sitz and Joshua Sollenberger (702.24) that took home second.