As Hunter Atha was growing up, everyone thought he would be a football player given the success his father had in the sport.
 
Bob Atha was a standout for the Worthington High School football team and went on to play at Ohio State from 1978-81 as a backup quarterback to Art Schlichter and Mike Tomczak and a placekicker before playing in the NFL for the St. Louis Cardinals and the Miami Dolphins.
 
The younger Atha, however, took a different path. A Worthington Kilbourne sophomore, he scored 374.4 points to win the diving title in the OCC-Central Division meet last Friday at Dublin Parks and Recreation Center.
 
"A lot of people always asked me if I was a kicker or if I played football," Atha said. "But my dad excelled at a lot of things. Whatever I wanted to try, he supported me."
 
Atha was the only league champion for the Kilbourne boys team at the OCC-Central meet, which concluded last Saturday at Thomas Worthington. The Wolves scored 144.5 points to finish fourth, behind champion Upper Arlington (435), Thomas (215.5) and Dublin Coffman (208) and ahead of Hilliard Davidson (111), Hilliard Darby (106) and Central Crossing (48).
 
Atha prevented UA from completing a sweep of the OCC-Central meet. The Golden Bears finished in the top three spots in the 200-yard freestyle, the 100 butterfly and the 100 backstroke and won every event, except diving.
 
Kilbourne's girls team also finished fourth, scoring 107 points to finish behind UA (432), Thomas (293) and Coffman (204) and ahead of Darby (97), Central Crossing (76) and Davidson (68). UA, which is aiming for a sixth consecutive Division I state title, won eight of the 12 events.
 
All four OCC divisions competed together in diving last Friday. Atha had the second-highest score, behind Dublin Jerome's Jacob Kasper (401.85).
 
Atha said the format was a confidence booster before heading into the Division I district meet Feb. 20 at Ohio State. The boys and girls teams for Kilbourne and Thomas will compete in the sectional Feb. 13 at Thomas, but there is no diving competition at sectional.
 
The top two finishers in each swimming event at sectional automatically qualify for district, with 26 at-large district berths for each event also being awarded based on times at the two Central sectionals and the East and Southeast sectionals.
 
"I really liked the way they ran the diving meet," Atha said of the OCC-Central meet. "You weren't competing against all the divers; you were competing with them. It kind of gives you a sense of the way things will be at the districts."