By Bill Martin
LSU Sports Information
“Sport is 90 percent mental and 10 percent physical.” That popular and inspiring quote has made its way through the sports of numerous teams, coaches and their athletes. Finding a mental edge to achieving success is a difficult task for most athletes to discover.
Mental preparation may not be more evident than in the sport of swimming and diving. In the past three seasons, one LSU diver in particular, has stood amongst the best divers in the country, combining her mental toughness with exceptional talent to earn three All-America honors over the past two seasons.
When Jessica Wantz first signed a letter of intent to LSU, she envisioned the aspirations every student athlete expects when he or she first steps foot on campus.
“The whole atmosphere, from the Athletic Department to the campus, convinced me that LSU was the place for me,” Wantz explained. “I wanted to display my talents and do well.”
Coming out of high school in 2001, Wantz was a four-time All-American at Memorial High School in Houston, Texas. She won the state championship twice and was recognized as the Texas High School Diver of the Year her junior and senior seasons.
The diving program at the time, under the direction of former coach Scott Reich, needed to fill the vacancy left by Ashley Culpepper, an 11-time All-American and arguably the most prolific diver in school history. Wantz was to be that person.
Two months into her freshman season, Wantz made the impact that every person involved in the swimming and diving program expected. As the team competed at the prestigious Nike Cup Invitational, it was Wantz who stood above the rest, winning the 1-meter and 3-meter competitions with the highest scores of the season.
But as any swimming or diving coach or team member knows, the success one has is most important when the championship season arrives in early spring. Wantz never got that shot in the spring of 2001. Mononucleosis kept her out of the entire second half of the season, but what could have been looked upon as a disappointment turned into a positive.
“I had to deal with it, but it was alright,” Wantz said. “I used the rest to get stronger and prepare for the following season.”
As the 2002-03 season approached, Doug Shaffer took over the ranks of diving coach and an offseason of rigorous mental and physical training prepared Wantz for the breakout season that lay ahead.
“Diving is one of the most mentally exhausting sports and can be emotionally frustrating, but he does a great job at maintaining some sanity for all of us,” she said. “He wants us to do the best we can during our training to set ourselves up for success when the season comes along.”
The preparation paid off four months later. Wantz reached the finals of the 3-meter at the Minnesota Invitational, and one event later she was victorious at the Georgia Invitational in the same event with a career-high score 535.35. She became the first diver at LSU to earn SEC Diver of the Week accolades in over a year for her effort in Athens.
Then came her first shot at the NCAA Championships in March of 2003. In her first major competition, Wantz left as an All-American, placing fourth out of the nation’s best divers in the 3-meter.
“I was really proud and happy for her,” Shaffer exclaimed. “For her to finish in the top five was outstanding, considering she was out the entire second half of last season.”
Entering her junior year, Wantz envisioned greater accomplishments in learning how to master both boards. Her success in the 3-meter carried over into the 1-meter.
“Her level of competitiveness and her ability to find her zone are second to none,” Shaffer said. “When she can go within herself and increase her level of competition, there is no stopping her.”
She picked up her first victories of the 2003-04 season by sweeping both events on Oct. 25 at Delta State. It would be her last competition of the fall season when a neck injury sidelined her for three months. Wantz had torn a ligament in her neck while training and the possibility that her season was over surfaced yet again.
“I spent a month in a neck brace and nursed it the best I could,” Wantz said. “Then three weeks before the SEC Championships, the doctors cleared me for activity.”
What could have been a season-ending injury, turned into an obstacle that was easily overturned thanks to the preparation and mental toughness the 22-year old displayed.
She returned to the water on Jan. 30 in a non-conference dual meet versus Rice in Baton Rouge. Three weeks later, Wantz and the Tigers headed to Athens for the 2004 SEC Championships. While not fully recovered, she managed to place fifth in the 3-meter and sixth in the 1-meter in her first major competition of the season.
As the 2004 NCAA Championships rolled around, Wantz knew that her best dives still lay ahead. But with little physical training since her injury and facing the best divers in the world, she did not know what to expect.
On the first day of competition, she dove to a fifth-place finish in the 1-meter to earn first-team All-America honors in that event for the first time in her career.
Shaffer called the performance “magnificent”, citing that her focus and intensity carried to a career-best in the 1-meter. One day later, Wantz carried the momentum into the 3-meter and shattered her previous highest finish by placing third with a career-high score of 540.15.
“It makes you feel accomplished as an athlete when you are able to do what you do,” she said. “It encourages you for the next season and makes you work that much harder.
As the stretch run for the final season of her career approaches, Wantz has taken more of a leadership role and progresses everyday, with every practice.
“She is still developing and hasn’t reached her full potential yet,” Shaffer said. “This year, she is healthier, stronger and we have increased her level of difficulty to be more competitive. If she does the things right on a day-to-day basis, it would be reasonable to expect that her performance would be of the highest level at the national championships.”
When asked to sum up Jessica in one word, the third-year head coach who once defeated the legendary Greg Louganis simply said “gifted”.
“There is no doubt she can win at the NCAA Championships,” he said. “She has the talent, the competitive spirit, the drive and the diving skills to be able to do it.”