University of California, Los Angeles, Athletics
NCAA Championship Blog - April 24, 2008
April 24, 2008 | Gymnastics
April 24, 2008
Way too late a.m. - Between having internet problems and going to the team dinner after the meet, all of our post-meet website updates got done way too late. Apologies!
As predicted, surviving this loaded evening session was going to be tough, and the Bruins finished just .175 out of third place and .225 out of second.
Tasha Schwikert's all-around victory was certainly quite bittersweet for her. Although she became the first Bruin ever to win two NCAA all-around titles and the second to win two national all-around titles (joining Sharon Shapiro, who won a pair of AIAW crowns), it was hard to enjoy this one after the team got edged out out of Team Finals, and as she said in the press conference, she would have traded her all-around title for the team to still be competing on Friday. Still, winning multiple NCAA all-around titles in a career is quite an accomplishment, one only six other gymnasts have done.
Although they aren't competing Friday night, the Bruins (who are already looking forward to a big comeback in 2009) still have good chances to return home with individual hardware. Tasha has qualified for event finals on vault, bars and floor. Comforte is in on vault and bars, and Anna will be one of the final three competitors on bars, where she scored a 9.95 tonight. Bar finals is going to be a big one, with 17 (!) finalists. Anna going near the end is a huge plus. As we saw last year with Tasha and in 2002 with Doni Thompson, going first is very difficult. I do wonder when the last time (if ever) the first person up won at event finals ...
8:25 pm - Halfway through the competition, and the Bruins have a 98.275 after a season-high 49.475 on bars and a 48.8 on beam.
Ariana Berlin got the team off to a solid start with a 9.775, and the Bruins followed it up with five straight routines with stuck dismounts. Shavahn Church hit beautiful handstands, got huge height on her toe-on hecht to the high bar and stuck her double tuck dismount for a career-high 9.875. Jordan Schwikert effortlessly stuck a full pirouette to double pike and scored 9.85. Kristina Comforte and Tasha Schwikert each stuck their double layout dismounts to score 9.9s, and Anna Li closed it out with a huge Tkatchev and stuck double layout for a 9.95 score. Georgia scored 49.35 on beam to finish the first rotation in second place, while Stanford totaled 49.175 on floor, and Denver earned 48.625 on vault.
On beam in rotation two, the Bruins had to fight for a 48.8 on balance beam in rotation two after a fall and a low-scored routine. Berlin started off with a 9.8, but Niki Tom was not credited by half of the judging panel for connection on her flight series (which she has been doing all year) and scored 9.55. The individual judges' scores were all over the board - 9.75, 9.45, 9.3 and 9.65. And with a long conference to try to settle the discrepancy, Jordan Schwikert was standing on the podium trying to stay loose. Miss Val walked out to the beam to keep Jordan loose, waving her arms to the music ("Open Arms") as she walked out. Unfortunately, the long wait (eight minutes, from what I have been told) seemed to have an effect on Jordan, who fell off the beam during her flight series and 9.0. Comforte hit a 9.85, Tasha a 9.825 and Anna a 9.775 for a team total of 48.8. That score was about what all the other teams scored in session I but .55 less than what Georgia scored in the first rotation.
7:10 pm - It's widely accepted that tonight's preliminary session will be one of the toughest ever, with five teams that were ranked in the Top 10 during the regular season battling it out for just three spots in the Super 6. Georgia finished the regular season first, Utah second, Michigan fifth, Stanford sixth and UCLA ninth. Not only is going to be tough for any of the teams to get out of this session, but it's going to be difficult to make Event Finals.
Scoring in the first session was tough on beam. Not a single team scored above 49 on beam, although some of the competitors said that the beam was moving around. Yikes. Florida, Alabama and LSU qualified for tomorrow's finals. This will be LSU's first-ever trip to the Super Six.
Session II is about to start. The Bruins were lined up to be the first team to be introduced in this preliminary session. As they stood in the hallway waiting for intros to begin, they did a few chants and cheers to fire each other up. Like at basketball games, they did the Roll Call, doing a sing-songy chant of each person's name until they waved, i.e. Mar-ci Bern-holtz (clap clap clap clap clap). They also did the Bruin territory chant, and a few shouts of Westwood were also heard in the hallway.
The Bruins begin on uneven bars, with Ariana Berlin, Shavahn Church, Jordan Schwikert, Kristina Comforte, Tasha Schwikert and Anna Li up on deck.
