Utah coach Megan Marsden can remember standing in the corridor before the NCAA championships in 2009. There were five teams from the SEC among the Super Six and those girls began to chant “SEC! SEC!” before walking into the arena.
“Our girls didn’t know what to do. We didn’t even have a chant,” Marsden said. ‘What were supposed to do, chant ‘Mountain West?’ I think our girls were shouting ‘Sugar Bowl!’ That’s all we had to hang our hat on at that point.”
And while the SEC, which has produced six of the past seven national gymnastics champions, still leaves a heavy footprint in the sport, the western school may be catching up. The Pac-12, which now includes Utah, qualified three teams for the Super Six and is preaching solidarity leading into the NCAA gymnastics finals Saturday.
“We’re excited about being part of a bigger family,” Marsden said “We’re excited about three Pac-12 teams qualifying.”
UCLA coach Valorie Kondos Field, who is completing her 22nd season at the school, is pleased to have the company. She acknowledged that sometimes her team felt like a stranger in a strange land.
“I think all of our programs have experienced being in the Super Six with very heavy SEC representation,” Field said. “And it is a bit odd. You do feel like you’re a foreigner sometimes.
“Obvious you don’t once the meet gets started. But walking through the hotel, walking through the hallways here, walking onto the floor, when the teams are marching out, that’s when it really hits you. With our conference getting immeasurably stronger, there is a comfort to familiarity.”
The comfort and familiarity was obvious in the first semifinal session Friday. UCLA, the 2010 champion and winner of six national championships, surged ahead in the final rotation to place first. The Bruins got a pair of 9.9s on the floor and finished with 197.4 points, enough to slip past Utah with 197.2 and Stanford with 197.125. Oklahoma was fourth at 196.25.
The second session was won by defending national champion Alabama, thanks to a dominant performance on the bars, their final event, where they had a pair of 9.9s and scored 49.4 points. The Crimson Tide finished with 197.675 and edged Florida with 197.65 and Arkansas with 197.15.
Georgia failed to qualify out of the second session. The Bulldogs, who placed fifth with 196.5 points, never showed the spark that enabled the Bulldogs to win the regional at Auburn two weeks ago. Georgia rallied to survive a scare in its first event, the bars, but looked flat on the beam and floor and never mounted a challenge, much to the disappointment of a large contingent of Bulldogs fans.
There’s no question that the western schools have formed an alliance with each other. Although they’re fiercely competitive with each other, there are definite emotional bonds that have been established.
“I think being a part of the Pac-12 Conference — the coaches, the athletes and the respect we have for one another — is very different than other conferences,” said Stanford coach Kristen Smyth. “I think we do get genuinely excited for the Pac-12 teams to move on.”
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