What freshman girl do you know who--I misses Eugene, her family's "fat, stupid" basset hound more than anything else from home?

I comes from Louisville, Ky. but can name you more old Chicago Cub stars than practically any Wrigley Field bleacher bum?

I once was kissed by the "huge, slobbery, slimy tongue" of Shamu the killer whale on a childhood visit to Sea World?

I earlier this year ended up with a friend's birthday cake smashed on the top of her head?

I motivated, without any coercion, the entire Harvard women's swimming team to sit and cheer her diving performance instead of resting between the trials and finals of this year's Ivy League Championship meet? (Swimmers notoriously hate diving!)

I rewarded those swimmers' loyalty with Harvard's only first-place finish in that meet?

I didn't even tell her roommates when she was voted Women's Ivy Athlete of the Week earlier this winter?

The answer is ... Pam Stone, freshman diver extraordinaire.

Her dramatic victory in the Ivy Championships and her selection as the Athlete of the Week have made her somewhat of a celebrity in Crimson sporting circles recently, but her infectious smile and good humor long ago endeared her to those fortunate enough to know her.

"I've enjoyed having her on my team as much as anyone I've ever coached," diving coach John Walker said unabashedly. "She's extremely humble, always considerate and just a lot of fun to be around. Put her on a board and she dives well, too," he adds as an afterthought.

Goodwill among members of the diving corps has been characteristic of the group during Coach Walker's highly successful seven-year tenure here. It didn't take long this year for a strong bond of friendship and mutual admiration to be formed between Pam and other members of the crew.

During the first week of practice (almost immediately after school began), Walker suggested to veterans Jamie Greacen and Steve Schramm that it was time they called a team meeting. "It was great," Pam recalled. "You know, it was the kind of meeting you have at Charlie's Kitchen."

By this time, Pam's diving peers were already impressed, not only with her talent but with her eager attitude toward diving and her ever-cheerful nature. These attributes fit in beautifully with the corps' group motivational and self-reinforcing character.

Indicative of Pam's perserverance and willpower has been her experience with a certain dive--a forward dive with one- and one-half somersaults in pike position--this year.

Diving scores are calculated by taking the judges' awards on a particular dive and multiplying their sum by the degree of difficulty (DD) pre-assigned by the national rules committee to that dive. The harder the dive, the higher the DD. DDs range from 1.0 to 3.0.