Heading into his first year on the high school swimming and diving team at Seymour High School, freshman Devin Ramsey needed a niche in the program.

With a small, athletic build, Ramsey quickly found himself standing on his toes at the edge of the diving board performing various flips and twists into the diving well of the Owls’ pool.

Things came naturally for the freshman from the start.

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Now, with his first postseason meet under his belt, Ramsey will make some school history.

On Saturday, Ramsey placed fourth at the Floyd Central Sectional, tallying 369.75 total points off the judges’ cards.

“It feels great. I’ve been told I’m one of the first freshmen to make it to regional,” Ramsey said. “At the start, I was nervous. I picked it up pretty quickly. I’m ready (for the regional).”

While many divers have advanced to the next round of the postseason at Seymour, Ramsey is the first freshman to move on to the Bloomington North Regional, conducted at 6 p.m. tonight. The top eight finishers at each of the four regionals move on to the state finals.

Ramsey said he likes the acrobatics of diving and the pressure of performing in front of an audience, which is why he stuck with the event.

“I like the flips,” Ramsey said. “Diving has a lot of intensity. It’s a lot of fun to just dive straight into the water.”

In the regular season, Ramsey had five first-place finishes and a pair of second-place scores.

At the Hoosier Hills Conference meet Jan. 30 in Jeffersonville, Ramsey scored 334 points to finish fifth.

Owls swimming and diving coach Dave Boggs said Ramsey has a lot of confidence for a freshman and has just continued to get better as the season winds down.

“You roll the dice (with a freshman),” Boggs said. “He’s pretty poised for a freshman. Going through the conference meet, he did a good job. Sectional was pretty much our conference meet again minus Bedford and Columbus East. He had a little taste of this already this season, and I think it helped him (Saturday).”

Boggs said Ramsey uses every inch of his frame to get high above the board to perform.

“He has good body awareness, Boggs said. “He picks things up really well. He’s built like a diver and gets everything out of his body.”

Ramsey said he will have to make a lot of improvements to advance to the state competition this weekend at IUPUI.

The Castle, Columbus North, Franklin Community, Jasper and Floyd Central sectionals feed into the Bloomington North Regional.

Just nine freshmen of 80 total divers advanced to one of the four regional rounds across the state.

With lots of young talent in the surrounding areas, five of those freshmen will compete at the Bloomington North Regional.

Boggs said the competition will be stiff in Bloomington North’s diving well tonight.

“There will be 20 divers, and the top eight will move on,” Boggs said. “(Ramsey) will have to put together a really good day. Every dive, he will have to nail it and impress the judges. He will have to go in and make an impact. Hopefully, he will wow them in warmups and hit his first couple dives. Then we will just go from there.”

Seymour’s last diver to get this far into the postseason was Chris Robinson, who won the conference, sectional and regional in 2014 to advance to state.

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WHAT: Diving regional

WHERE: Bloomington North High School

WHO: Seymour freshman Devin Ramsey

TIME: 6 p.m. today

ADMISSION: $5

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