LI’s Andrew Capobianco advances to Olympic springboard diving semifinals

Long Island native Andrew Capobianco finished 17th in qualifying in the men’s individual 3-meter springboard diving event Monday morning at the Tokyo Olympics.

The top 18 divers in the preliminaries advanced to Tuesday’s semifinals, which begin around 9 p.m. EST Monday night, with the finals to follow around 2 a.m. Tuesday morning.

China took the top two spots in the preliminaries, as Wang Zongyuan totaled the highest score over six dives with 531.30 points. Teammate Xie Siyi ranked second at 520.90. The pair already teamed up to win the 3-meter synchro title in Tokyo.

Capobianco scored 385.50 for his six dives in qualifying. His scores for each dive were 74.80, 68.25, 71.75, 36.00, 66.30 and 68.40.

Capobianco, a first-time Olympian, is trying for his second medal at these Olympic Games. He captured a silver medal with Michael Hixon in the men’s 3-meter synchronized springboard diving competition last week.

The 21-year-old Capobianco grew up in Wantagh before moving to North Carolina for high school. The Mineola-born Capobianco became the first seventh-grader to win the Nassau diving championship when he was competing for Wantagh High School in 2012. His score broke the county record. He repeated as county champion and broke the record he set a year earlier as an eighth-grader. He moved to North Carolina and graduated from Holly Springs High School in 2017. He’s a seven-time All-American at Indiana University.

The Chinese have won four of the first five Olympic diving events. They took silver in the men’s 10-meter platform synchronized event.

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Rommel Pacheco Marrufo of Mexico was third at 479.25.

Japan’s Ken Terauchi qualified in 10th. He’s competing in his sixth Olympics at age 40 and is trying to win the host country’s first diving medal.

The other American, Tyler Downs, finished 23rd.

By From Staff and Wire Reports