Congratulations to the week 10 champion, Stacie Webb’s beam, the first 10 in Southern Utah history, which beat out Katelyn Ohashi’s beam in second place and Kiana Winston’s beam in third. It was the week of beam.
To the vote for the conference championships, meets that brought us four more 10.000s, all from gymnasts who have already received 10s on those events this season. Be more interesting, humanity. Continue reading Best Routine of Conference Championships Poll→
Congratulations to our week 8 champion, Alex McMurtry’s floor, which used a boost from Team Florida to run away with the title ahead of Hallie Mossett’s floor in second. In an upset, Nicole Lehrmann’s bars 10 outpaced McKenzie Wofford’s bars 10 for the third position by a mere 9 votes.
On to week 9! A week marked by at least one 10 on every event, twelve scores of 9.975 or higher, and thirty-seven scores of 9.950 or higher. Thirty-seven.
Congratulations to the week 4 champion, Kyla Ross’s 10.000 on bars, which strolled to victory ahead of Alex McMurtry’s DTY in second and Peng-Peng Lee’s bars in third. I hope you’re pleased with yourselves because Ross falling on bars this week is 100% your fault. Lee joins Skinner as the only two gymnasts to have finished in the top three twice this year, both on two separate events.
Congratulations to our week 1 champion, MyKayla Skinner’s floor routine, which just edged out Kennedi Edney’s vault in 2nd and Maggie Nichols’ bars in 3rd.
Each week, I’ll put up the top routines of the previous weekend and let you guys vote on which routine wins the award for best of the week. Deciding the nominees is up to me (mwahahahaha) and is based on 3) score, 2) overall quality, and 1) which ones are easily available online—aka, which ones have been uploaded by our dear NastiaFan101. Because, you know, we need to be able to see them in order to vote for them. So if you want to vote for Elizabeth Price…get those meets to start taking place in the present day. With color televisions. And the iron horse.
Feel free to use the comments for reasoning and/or write-in votes.
Last night, LSU conducted its now-annual Gymnastics 101 (GET IT BECAUSE THIS IS A COLLEGE) to showcase the team’s best routines heading into the new season. It was…exactly what you would expect from a meet a month before the season begins. Sort of getting there. It did, however, provide a glorious opportunity for us to dig into the lineups and prospects for the upcoming season, so let’s go.
LSU ROSTER 2017
Seniors
Sydney
Ewing
Competed VT, BB, FX every meet in 2016
2016 RQS: VT – 9.905, BB – 9.870, FX – 9.865
Ashleigh Gnat
Team’s top routine & anchor on VT, BB, FX
Can contribute UB as needed
2016 RQS: FX – 9.980, VT – 9.965, BB – 9.895
2016 average: UB – 9.727
Shae
Zamardi
Weekly UB routine each of last two seasons
Provides FX option
2016 RQS: UB – 9.875
2016 average: FX – 9.517
Juniors
Myia
Hambrick
Competed AA at nearly every meet in 2016, ranked 10th nationally
They’re inching closer. The question for the LSU Tigers is not whether they can make Super Six in 2017. They can and better, otherwise they’ll have squandered a championship-level roster twice in three years. The question right now is whether LSU can improve on last season’s “Oh, so close” and actually take the title for the first time.
It’s a distinct possibility, one that will largely depend on just how good Oklahoma ends up being this year. Still, LSU has lost very few routines from last season, which provides an opportunity for improvement over last season’s 2nd-place side. If the Tigers can get just a little better on bars and a little more consistent on beam, there’s every reason to expect them to be able to challenge the Sooners. Continue reading LSU 2017→
The champion of the week was Ashleigh Gnat, who recorded the first vault 10 of the new vault era by sticking her DTY. Because that’s what happens when you stick DTYs. You get 10s. Do I hear an Amanar? Sorry. I’ll stop. OMG YOU GUYS, my aunt’s cousin’s best enemy’s roommate totally saw Ashleigh Gnat training an Amanar. I SWEAR.
“Oh snap, she stuck it!” Oh Sac, never leave us ever. What if KJC said “Oh snap” when someone landed a vault? I’ll let you go enjoy your made life.
-Florida retains the #1 ranking after a fine-not-great showing at Auburn, a score brought down by some discomfort/Bridget Sloan improvisation on beam that had not been a factor in earlier performances, along with the continued half-a-floor-lineup situation. Oklahoma gained ground in the rankings after putting up a much more Oklahoma-January type performance, still having to endure one beam fall but without the total number of mistakes that kept the first couple meets in more pedestrian territory.
-The emergence of Natalie Von Lovelyton has been a pleasant develop in the reconstruction of Oklahoma’s lineups this season, with her pretty, twisty routines characteristic of the early-KJ Oklahoma era. Brown has a front 2/1 on floor, an E pass but not a double salto E pass, though I’ve noticed that overall the Sooners are going much simpler than their capability on floor, aside from Scaman. Jackson, Jones, and Capps sometimes are all more than capable of big double-salto E passes, but they haven’t been bringing the big. At least not yet. That’s even more true for UCLA’s lineup, which is a march of the double pikes until Bynum in the anchor spot. It will be interesting to watch when or if the in-your-face difficulty is reintroduced to some of these routines, or if these coaches just decide to say, “Hey, this is what we can do cleanly, and we don’t need to do more. Over the last two or three years, clean, amplitudinous double pike routines have received 9.950s and even 10.000s in anchor spots, so…..deal with it.”
-When I said in December that this would be the season of beam, I meant it in a good way. I really did. There’s so much pretty happening on beam this year, just right now it tends to be happening in a windstorm and on the ground.
-Georgia. Good improvement? Coming off of last weekend’s four falls, Georgia recorded three falls and a missed connection this time, so it’s way better and everything’s fine. We’re number 43! We’re number 43! Brandie Jay is their rock, so that’s where Georgia’s beam is. It’s officially a balance beam situation. At this point, the gymnasts are already displaying a level of terror that can only be described as “our coach just decided that we’re going to try to take a bus across Pennsylvania in the middle of a blizzard,” so it’s only going to get worse after this latest showing.
-It’s the first sign of the inevitable and oncoming beam revolt during which the beams will rise up and battle the humans for the future of the planet in a laser war. As part of this opening salvo, one beam also stole Avery Rickett’s foot and forced Alabama to count two falls, taking away what looked like an easy 197, and another comrade tried to pop a cap at Katelyn Ohashi as she double piked to her neck following a misguided round off. UCLA did not have to endure the same level of beam catastrophe (because the world is upside down) as Ohashi got to go again due to equipment malfunction. Which it did. That’s what happens when you’re relying on the structural integrity of only the cap to keep you on the beam. Somehow, she was able to be not in a thousand pieces after that landing and did go again, hitting the double pike this time and recording a 9.825.
-Through three weeks, the current top four teams have not had to count a fall, in some cases more surprising than others. I joke about UCLA, but having a solid and clear six beamers this year without the need to mix and match and rearrange seems to be doing the trick so far. That’s already a postseason lineup, just needing to straighten up a couple ragged edges and Sophina dismounts here and there. Michigan is a 196.9 machine, just sneaking up to that plateau for the 4th consecutive week after petitioning some beam scores at the last minute. Four straight 196.9s is kind of insane but also emblematic of the even-steven nature of this team in 2015 and now 2016. Michigan is the least susceptible to wild variations in performance from meet to meet. What you expect is what you get, which is much less heart-attacky than what we got used to during those couple seasons right after the Botterman era. Wolverine fans have earned this.
-While everyone else is having a balance beam situation, Utah is having a floor exercise situation. Someone should start that blog. Utah’s high on floor is a 49.025 right now. And yes, that whole lineup graduated after last season, but the remaining floor workers are much more talented than the performances they have been throwing out there, especially Lee and Lewis who should be hitting us over the head with 9.875-9.900s every time. What’s even going on around here?
-Nina McGee has a 10 and a 9.975 on floor so far this season. Amazing what happens when people suddenly start paying attention to the huge routines you’ve been doing for three years.
-Stanford got a 196.675 over the weekend. Didn’t someone tell them that it’s still only January? Ladies, you’re not supposed to get good scores until March. At the earliest. What is this?
