Between RMAC and National championship titles, this year at Colorado Mesa University has been one for the record books. Softball almost was undefeated and two divers took first and second place at nationals. These athletes have stepped up their game.
Ammar Hassan’s story really deserves to be told and rewarded. He competed in Egypt on the national level. In January, he transferred to CMU months after representing his home country of Egypt in the 2017 FINA World Aquatics Championships in Budapest, Hungary.
Hassan would then find himself at CMU. His first meet as a Maverick would indeed be the RMAC Championships. He made the best first impression possible.
He won both the one-meter and the three-meter in the RMAC Championships in would would earn him the Diver of the Meet for the conference championships.
Hassan would then go on to compete at the NCAA Div. II National Championships where he swept both the one-meter and three-meter events.
He is the first athlete in the CMU Diving program to win a national title.
It is an amazing story when you have a special athlete like Hassan come into an already thriving diving program like CMU’s. Head Diving coach Logan Pearsall has taken the program and made it into one of the best in the country.
Besides Hassan, two other CMU divers finished within the top six. Sophomore Noah Macomber finished second behind Hassan in overall points and senior Sage D’Ambrosia took sixth overall in his final meet as a Maverick.
Hassan will be the one to lead CMU diving into the future in which shows so much promise for the years to come.
Hassan has lived and breathed diving while he has been at CMU and is planning to compete again in 2019. He feels that CMU has given him more confidence.
“My coach always helping me saying be confident,” Hassan said. “I only remember this while I’m jumping: I can do it, it’s my jump.”
He has a difficult 1-meter and 3-meter dive that not many other athletes attempt. These dives put him ahead by 20-30 points.
“Finally, I made it,” Hassan said. “I broke the national record on the 3-meter.”
CMU coach Pearsall and Hassan are seeing where they can take things from now until the 2020 Olympics. Making it to the Olympics is Hassan’s dream and Pearsall is right by his side, doing what he can to prepare Hassan.
