Saturday, Apr. 4 - 6pm ET / 3pm PT
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UCLA Seeks NCAA Championship Berth
No. 7 UCLA (17-2) is the No. 2 seed at the NCAA Columbus Regional and will compete for one of two available berths in the NCAA Championships, which are being held in Fort Worth, Texas Apr. 17-19. The Regional meet will take place at Ohio State's St. John Arena on Saturday, Apr. 4 at 6 pm ET. Also competing at the Regional are sixth-ranked Michigan, 18th-ranked Arizona, 21st-ranked Central Michigan, 26th-ranked Kentucky, and host and 32nd-ranked Ohio State.
Follow Live
A live stream, along with live stats, will be available at ohiostatebuckeyes.com, and live updates can be found on Twitter by following @UCLAGymnastics.
Rotation Order
The rotation order for the Regional was determined by blind draw prior to the selections. The No. 2 seed Bruins will begin the meet on a bye before uneven bars then will begin competition in rotation two on bars before moving to beam, a bye, floor exercise and vault. Kentucky begins on vault, Michigan starts on bars, Arizona begins on beam, Central Michigan is on a bye before floor, and Ohio State begins on floor.
Regional Championship History
The Bruins have won 20 regional titles, including three in the last five years. The Bruins placed second to Utah at the Fayetteville Regional in 2014, with Samantha Peszek winning the all-around, bars and beam. Two years ago, UCLA competed at the Columbus Regional at Ohio State and finished second behind LSU, scoring 196.950 to LSU's 197.275.
Peszek Family Reunion
For the first time ever, Indianapolis-based sisters Samantha Peszek and Jessie Peszek will compete against each other. Samantha, a redshirt senior, is competing at the Columbus Regional with her UCLA team, while Jessie, a sophomore, qualified as an individual on the uneven bars.
Regular Season All-Americans
Five UCLA gymnasts were awarded a total of seven regular season All-America honors by the National Association of College Gymnastics Coaches (NACGC/W). The Bruins earned a total of four first-team honors and three second-team honors. First-team honorees were Samantha Peszek on beam, Danusia Francis on beam and Christine Peng-Peng Lee on bars and beam. Earning second-team acclaim were Peszek and Jordan Williams on vault and Sadiqua Bynum on floor. Peszek now has a total of 12 All-America honors in her career, and Francis has three. Lee, Williams and Bynum received their first career All-America awards.
Five Earn All-Pac-12 Honors
Five members the UCLA Gymnastics team were named to the 2015 Pac-12 All-Conference first-team. UCLA led all conference teams with a total of seven first-team honors. Samantha Peszek received first-team acclaim on vault and beam, her third career honor on beam and first on vault, and Danusia Francis earned her third-straight honor on balance beam. Christine Peng-Peng Lee, in her first competitive season, was named to the first team on bars and beam. Jordan Williams, in her first season at UCLA as a graduate student, earned her first career All-Pac-12 honor on vault. Also earning first-time acclaim was Sadiqua Bynum, who was selected to the first-team on floor exercise.
In the Rankings
UCLA finished the regular season ranked No. 7 in the national rankings with a Regional Qualifying Score (RQS) of 197.200. RQS is determined by taking the top six scores, three of which must be on the road, dropping the high score and averaging the remaining five marks. The Bruins finished ranked No. 7 on vault (49.375), No. 11 on bars (49.280), No. 2 on beam (49.400) and No. 8 on floor (49.340). Samantha Peszek ended the regular season ranked No. 1 on beam (9.945), No. 10 on vault (9.925) and No. 20 on bars (9.895). Four other Bruins finished with Top 20 rankings - Christine Peng-Peng Lee (5th on bars and 7th on beam), Danusia Francis (tied for 3rd on beam), Jordan Williams (tied for 14th on vault) and Sadiqua Bynum (tied for 13th on floor).
Bruins Second at Pac-12 Championships
UCLA placed second at the Pac-12 Gymnastics Championships, earning its second-highest score of the season, 197.350, but finishing behind host Utah, who repeated as Pac-12 champions with a score of 198.150. The Bruins scored 49.275 or better on all four events despite a fall on three of the four events.
Senior Samantha Peszek won her second-straight Pac-12 balance beam title, scoring 9.95, and captured her first floor exercise crown, tying for first with two others with a score of 9.95. Peszek also tied for second in the all-around with a 39.575.
Peszek Named Finalist for AAI Award
UCLA senior Samantha Peszek has been selected as a finalist for the AAI Award, an award voted upon by collegiate gymnastics coaches for the senior gymnast of the year. Peszek has been a valued leader and competitor for UCLA since arriving to Westwood in 2011. She won the NCAA balance beam title as a freshman the Pac-12 beam title as a junior and has captured 12 All-America honors, four Scholastic All-America awards, three Pac-12 individual titles, and 12 Pac-12 weekly awards, including seven Pac-12 Gymnast of the Week honors. Peszek scored a perfect 10 on uneven bars in 2014 and has career-best marks of 9.95 on vault, beam and floor. She finished the 2015 regular season as the No. 1-ranked gymnast in the nation on beam and also finished in the Top 20 on vault and bars.
On the Rise
UCLA has posted team scores of 197 or higher in seven straight meets and has scored 49+ on its last 32 events. The Bruins have not had to count a fall since Jan. 23 at Utah in its only dual meet loss of the season. The Bruins' only two losses this season have come in Salt Lake City against Utah.
Bruins are Beaming
UCLA has scored over 49.4 on beam in five consecutive meets, including a 49.525 on Feb. 21, which was the eighth-highest beam score in school history. Only two other UCLA teams in the 2010s have scored higher on beam - the 2010 team, which scored 49.65 at Georgia, and the 2012 team, which scored 49.55 at California. The Bruins earned their 49.525 with six strong routines. Mikaela Gerber led off with a 9.8, followed by a 9.775 from Sonya Meraz. Sophina DeJesus scored 9.85, and then the back half of the lineup went stratospheric, with Danusia Francis scoring 9.95, Christine Peng-Peng Lee 9.975, and Samantha Peszek 9.95. The Bruins, who finished the regular season ranked No. 2 in the nation on beam, averaged 49.435 on beam in their last five meets, with scores of 49.525, 49.425, 49.475, 49.325 and 49.425.
Show-Stopping Floor
The Bruins' team score of 49.625 on floor exercise Mar. 7 was not only a season-high but the highest floor score by a Bruin team since the 2004 team scored 49.7 on Mar. 7 vs. Michigan. Four Bruins scored career-highs - Mikaela Gerber with a 9.85, Hallie Mossett with a 9.875, Sadiqua Bynum with a 9.975 and Samantha Peszek with a 9.95. Angi Cipra tied her season-best with a 9.9, and Danusia Francis recorded her fifth 9.9+ score of the year with a 9.925. UCLA has scored 49+ on floor in nine-straight meets.
Peszek Power
Fifth-year senior Samantha Peszek has been lights out this season, averaging 39.510 in five all-around performances and scoring 9.85 or better on 32 of 36 routines competed. Peszek, the Pac-12 Gymnast of the Week three times this season, has won three of five all-around competitions, scoring 39.55 to win at Oregon State and 39.625 to win at Utah and in the home quad meet. She has a team-high total of 18 victories out of a possible 41 and has placed in the Top 3 35 of 41 times. Peszek is averaging a team-best 9.905 on vault and has a team-high six vault wins. She also has four event wins on beam, three on bars and two on floor. Peszek is a finalist for the AAI Award, which is given to the nation's top senior gymnast.
Bynum Scores Big for Bruins
Redshirt junior Sadiqua Bynum has been consistently delivering big scores all season on vault and floor, averaging 9.858 on vault and 9.885 on floor. Bynum came oh-so-close to perfection on Mar. 7, scoring a career-high 9.975 on floor, breaking 9.925 for the first time in her career. Ranked 13th in the nation on floor, Bynum has scored 9.925 or higher on floor in seven of her last eight meets and has a team-best five event wins on the event. Bynum has scored 9.85 or better on 16 of her 19 routines this year with no mark lower than 9.7, which was scored in the season opener.
Francis. Danusia Francis
Week after week, junior Danusia Francis has been posting big scores for the Bruins. She has 13 scores of 9.9 or higher, including seven in her last five meets. Francis is averaging over 9.825 on all three events in which she competes - 9.857 on bars, 9.848 on beam and 9.828 on floor. Taking away her scores in the season opener, Francis is averaging 9.9 on beam, where she has scored 9.95 in three of her last five meets, and 9.875 on floor, where she has four 9.9+ scores in her last six meets with her James Bond-themed routine. On the year, Francis has recorded four event wins on beam and two on floor, and she has hit 29 consecutive routines. Her uneven bars average of 9.857 and national ranking of 34th are especially impressive considering she is the Bruins' leadoff performer.
Lee Back After Two-Year Layoff
Nearly three years after her last competition, redshirt sophomore Christine Peng-Peng Lee has had a very successful rookie campaign at UCLA, earning first-team regular season All-America honors on bars and beam. In her collegiate debut at Oregon State on Jan. 12, Lee showed zero signs of rust, winning two events and placing fourth in another. She stuck every dismount and hit every skill in her difficult routines, scoring 9.9 to win bars, 9.825 on a stuck Yurchenko full vault, and 9.875 to tie for first on beam. Against Cal on Feb. 1, she won both events in which she competed, scoring 9.95s on bars and beam, and was subsequently named the Pac-12 Specialist of the Week. She earned Pac-12 Freshman/Newcomer of the Week honors twice in the last four weeks and has contributed six 9.95+ scores this season, including a 9.975 on beam. Lee has totaled nine event wins this season, including five in 10 meets on bars. Lee tore ligaments in her knee in 2012 just before the Canadian National Championships and had two surgeries, one in 2012 and another in 2013.
Meraz Making Moves
Freshman walk-on Sonya Meraz became just the second Bruin this season to make it into the lineup as an all-arounder, competing in all four events in three meets. Meraz scored a career-best 39.3 in the all-around at Arkansas Mar. 13, placing third and also earning Top 3 finishes on three events. She set a new career-high on vault with a 9.85 and tied her career-best on beam with a leadoff score of 9.85. In her all-around debut vs. Washington, she won the meet with a score of 39.025 and capped her night with a career-high 9.875 on floor. She was even better at Stanford, scoring career-highs on all three events in which she competed, earning 9.85s on bars and beam and 9.9 on floor. She has competed as the Bruins' leadoff on beam the last four meets and has scored 9.85 in each meet. Meraz has hit every beam routine she has performed this season, averaging 9.822.
Williams Vaults Ahead
Graduate student Jordan Williams has scored career-highs of 9.95 on vault in four of her last six meets, moving into No. 14 in the national rankings and earning regular season All-America honors for the first time in her career. Williams earned her first 9.95 on Feb. 9 vs. Washington and then blasted three in a row on Feb. 21, Feb. 28 and Mar. 7. Williams, who came to Westwood from Arizona and is UCLA's first-ever graduate transfer, has averaged 9.888 on vault, with four victories and two second-place showings in 10 meets. She has also competed on beam in four meets and earned a career-best 9.875 to place fourth vs. Stanford.