A Pair of Local Divers Take Their Shot at 1 Slot

Both realize storming the podium Friday night in a sport dominated by Chinese divers would bolster their reputations.

"This meet is like an Olympic preview," Yarrison said. "There are a lot of people here who are going to be at the Olympics. We want to medal. I think that would prove clearly that we're competitive, and were we sent to Beijing, we'd do a good job."

For a long time, Yarrison thought her first Olympic chance four years ago would be her last. While executing a preliminary dive at the 2004 Olympic trials, she stretched a nerve in her shoulder so severely she lost feeling in her arm. She missed three months of training. Then, weeks after getting back in the pool at the University of Arizona, where she was attending school, she flipped an all-terrain vehicle at a friend's ranch, tearing three ligaments in her other shoulder.

That put her out for an additional five months.

The following April, she was back to training. A month later, she broke her ankle.

She transferred to the University of Texas, where she figured she would focus on her studies and dive for fun under Coach Matt Scoggin, a Great Falls native who attended Langley High. She had been sidelined nearly two years by the time she competed again in the spring of 2006. It was then that her career took another surprising turn: She finished first at the U.S. championships in the three-meter synchro event just weeks after meeting Johnston.

They had been introduced by their coaches at a qualifying meet for the championships because they had similar styles.

"It was like, 'Mary, this is Abby, Abby, this is Mary; now go out and try to do some jumps,' " Yarrison recalled. "We're the exact same build; we have similar mannerisms; we stand the same and walk the same. It's really strange."

Stranger yet has been Miller's path to the top of the sport. As a child, she dreamed of making an Olympic team in gymnastics, but her body broke down before her enthusiasm did. Forced out of the gym, she turned to diving, hoping only to be good enough to get the college scholarship she had been banking on.

"I really did not want to quit gymnastics," she said. "It took a long time to cross over. It's probably still a work in progress. . . . Going from landing on my feet to landing on my head was quite an issue."

Miller, however, learned fast, and she clicked with Soldati, her coach at Purdue, as well as Loukas, who trains at nearby Indiana University. She is certain that, even if things don't work out this year, she will have another Olympic opportunity in 2012.

Yarrison, however, is planning to retire after nearly two decades in diving. The only question is when: on July 8, the day after the U.S. Olympic team is announced, or on Aug. 25, the day after the Closing Ceremonies.

"If it ends in Beijing, fabulous," Yarrison said. "If it ends in Knoxville, that's okay, too. All of this has been fantastic."