PORTAGE – Little did Von Dawson know that getting in trouble for doing backflips in the hallway as a freshman would lead him down a path he never imagined.

“After he got in trouble a couple of times for that, I said, ‘Hey, do you want to try diving?’” said Portage Central dive coach Madeline Woods.

That was a sport the current junior never considered.

It wasn’t until school principal Eric Alburtus noticed Dawson doing backflips on the field after a football game that diving was mentioned again.

"I remember exactly that night,” Alburtus said. “Von did this beautiful flip, and I hustled to him and said, ‘I don’t know who you are yet, but you’ve got to become a diver.’

“I can’t take credit for the amazing athlete and diver Von is but I’m very, very happy that I played a teeny, tiny piece of him doing amazing work around here. He’s such a great kid.’

Dawson knew nothing about diving.

“In middle school, I really didn’t know that diving was a thing,” he said. “I knew they had a swimming program, but where I was, it wasn’t really posted as much.”

He decided to try it – and saying he took to it like the cliché “duck to water” is an understatement.

“Von had never stepped foot on a diving board before, then made it to the state meet his freshman year,” Woods said. “It was a pretty fun turnaround. He’s an incredibly athletic kid.”

His freshman year Dawson finished 29th at the MHSAA Lower Peninsula Division 2 Swimming & Diving Finals.

“Just being there as a freshman who had never dove before was impressive,” Woods said.

He took another step last winter as a sophomore, finishing eighth at the Finals. This season, his top reported 6-dive score ranks eighth statewide and sixth among Division 2 athletes, and his top 11-dive score is 14^th statewide and seventh in his division.

Starting from scratch

Dawson was full of confidence from the first day of practice.

“The first week I got a list of dives, and I learned fairly quickly,” he said. “(Woods) explained a dive to me and I was like. ‘I can do that. I want to try it.’ She’d either let me or I’d bother her enough until she let me do it.”

Woods said Dawson is always trying to push the limits.

“With Von, we hit the ground running.” she said. “The first two seasons was me telling him ‘No’ a lot.

“Can I try this? No, not yet, Can I try that? No, not yet. Then he would wear me down and he’d do the (dive) and it would usually be one excellent one and he’d bomb the next one.”

Dawson said he was even more fearless back then but when it came to Regionals, the nerves started to show.

“Regionals are so much more stressful than state meet because you have to qualify,” he said. "States is you’re already there, you’re ready. It’s two days you’re with your friends on the swim team, you’re hanging out at a hotel. It’s pretty awesome.”

During his sophomore season, Dawson honed his skills and earned all-state status.

“From freshman year to sophomore year, I did a really good job on my kickouts especially,” he said. “I think that’s what got me to eighth. I was a little more polished.”

This season, Woods said she banished the word “No.”

“We’re going to do all the big dives, anything you want to try, we’re up for it,” she said. “Now he has the base, now he has the skills, we’re going to do it and it’s been really, really fun.”

Dawson has done some of the biggest dives Woods has ever coached: “He has the highest degree of difficulty of any diver I’ve ever coached and he’s only a junior, which is pretty awesome.”

Continuing to climb

Besides being an elite athlete, Woods said Dawson is an incredibly personable person.

“Other coaches will come up to me to say how much they enjoy chatting with him,” she said. “At some of the bigger meets, there are divers who remember him from previous years. He’s really, really, friendly, a great sport and highly competitive.”

But to get where he is today, Dawson overcame some obstacles early in life.

“I was in foster care for eight years of my life,” he said. “I kinda hopped around different places. Group homes, this place, that place.”

He was adopted at age 13.

“They had two of my siblings and I went to live with them for two years before they adopted me,” he said. “They come to watch me all the time. I have about eight foster siblings and they’re my biggest fans, always cheering for me.”

Dawson has expanded his water skills by playing water polo in the fall.

“I make the joke that he collects fall sports like Pokémon cards,” Woods said. “He did cross country his first year, football his second year and water polo this year. I’ve been the lucky one that he’s kept, diving all three years. He also does track.”

Dawson has already reached one goal this season – topping his coach’s personal-best record. Woods was a four-year all-Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association diver at Kalamazoo College and competed in the NCAA Division III Championships her senior year.

Woods said she challenged him this year.

“His highest score going into junior year was something in the 260s,” she said. “My personal best from my college years on 3-meter, which is easier to get a higher score on, was 282.

"So I challenged him in the first couple meets to beat my PR (personal record). I think he did it in our third meet. Our next goal was to break 300 and two weeks he got 299.9 and last week he got 306.9, a point less than the pool record at Loy Norrix.”

Using scores from his school meets, Dawson already has qualified for the AAU Nationals next summer.

His immediate goal is to qualify for the MHSAA LPD2 Finals to be competed March 13-14 at Eastern Michigan University along with fellow Mustang divers, junior Ryley Berns and sophomores Greyden Trevino and Drew Chenery.

“Diving is a hard sport and not for everyone,” Woods said of Dawson, “but when you find someone who is willing to do some crazy things and throw his body through the air and spin and flip and twist for fun, that’s usually a pretty special person.”

Pam Shebest served as a sportswriter at the Kalamazoo Gazette from 1985-2009 after 11 years part-time with the Gazette while teaching French and English at White Pigeon High School. She can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Calhoun, Kalamazoo and Van Buren counties.

PHOTOS (Top) Portage Central’s Von Dawson begins a dive at his home pool. (Middle) From left: Dawson, Portage Central diving coach Madeline Woods and Portage Central principal Eric Alburtus. (Below) Dawson descends into the water during a dive. (Diving photos courtesy of Madeline Woods. Dawson and Woods headshots by Pam Shebest. Alburtus headshot courtesy of Portage Central High School.)