It’s NLI day!
To review:
NLI = National Letter of Intent
The National Letter of Intent is a document signed by future college athletes confirming their intent to attend and compete for a particular school. Signing the NLI signals the end of the recruiting process—i.e., all other schools must immediately cease recruiting that gymnast. The NLI is accompanied by the athletic aid (scholarship) agreement. Gymnasts can’t sign NLIs if they are not receiving athletic aid.
Wednesday marks the beginning of this year’s signing period, during which schools will finally reveal to us which gymnasts have signed on to join their programs for the 2022 competitive season. The large majority will be unsurprising since most of these gymnasts have been verbally committed to these schools since the womb, but there are always a few pieces of interest (usually regarding who doesn’t sign rather than who does).
So, let’s see what we see. If nothing else, this year will be a little different because typically these signing athletes would be tasked with replacing the routines contributed by seniors during the 2021 season, but with everyone being granted an extra year, that’s not necessarily the case this time. There will be more adding, without as much subtracting (potentially).
Many of the US Olympic hopefuls are planning to start college in the 2022 competitive season, but since a number of them have already signed with their schools during a previous period then deferred to pursue the Olympics, they won’t show up in these announcements. But, we are expecting to hear about McCallum, Eaker, Bowers, Suni Lee, Emily Lee, Aleah Finnegan, and Sloane Blakely among others in this week’s announcements. Continue reading National Signing Day 2021-2022
