March 25, 2013
The sixth-ranked UCLA Gymnastics team have earned a No. 1 seed at the NCAA Regionals and will travel to Ohio State to compete at the NCAA Columbus Regional. The meet will take place on Saturday, Apr. 6 at St. John Arena at 6 pm ET. Joining the Bruins in the Regional will be seventh-ranked LSU, 18th-ranked Arizona, 20th-ranked Ohio State, 24th-ranked Central Michigan and 31st-ranked North Carolina State.
Qualifying as individual all-arounders are Sarah Landes and Paige Jones from Utah State and Linnaea Hance, Katie Hawthorne and Jennifer Larsen from Air Force. Individual event qualifiers competing in the regional are Jessica Wallander from Air Force (vault, bars and floor) and Stefanie Daley from Utah State (beam).
The top two teams and the top two all-around competitors (who are not on an advancing team) from each regional will receive an automatic berth to the national championships at UCLA's Pauley Pavilion April 19-21. In addition, the event winners at each regional will advance to the national championships (in that event only) if they are not part of a qualifying team or an all-around qualifier.
The Bruins have Olympic order and will begin the regional meet on vault. LSU begins on a bye before bars, Central Michigan starts on bars, North Carolina State begins on beam, Arizona is on a bye before floor, and Ohio State starts on floor.
Last season, UCLA won its regional in Fayetteville, Ark. and went on to place third at the NCAA Championships. The Bruins have won a total of 20 NCAA Regional titles, including three in a row. The Bruins enter this year's regional with a RQS of 197.200 and a season average of 196.850.
The six regional fields and sites are as follows:
Columbus Regional (at Ohio State), 6 pm ET: UCLA, LSU, Arizona, Ohio State, Central Michigan, North Carolina State
Corvallis Regional (at Oregon State), 4 pm PT: Georgia, Oregon State, Arkansas, Boise State, Arizona State, California
Gainesville Regional (at Florida), 6 pm ET: Florida, Minnesota, Auburn, Maryland, Bridgeport, Pittsburgh
Morgantown Regional (at West Virginia), 6 pm ET: Michigan, Nebraska, Illinois, Kentucky, West Virginia, North Carolina
Norman Regional (at Oklahoma), 4 pm CT: Oklahoma, Stanford, Penn State, Washington, Iowa, Southern Utah
Tuscaloosa Regional (at Alabama), 6 pm CT: Alabama, Utah, Denver, Kent State, BYU, Iowa State