Cal Women's Gymnastics wins Pittsburgh Regional! (Live Blog)
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Cal Women's Gymnastics wins Pittsburgh Regional! (Live Blog)
Golden Bears will return to the NCAA Championships for the 5th time (2nd in the recent reduced-field era)!
UPDATE:
Behind a dominant beam rotation, California Golden Bears have won the Pittsburgh Regional. No.7 Cal will advance, along with No.2 Florida, to the NCAA Semifinal in Fort Worth, Texas in two weeks.
ROLL ON YOU BEARS!
The first four of eight tickets to the 2023 NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Championships were punched on Saturday. In the end, the expected No.1 Oklahoma and No.8 Kentucky advanced out of the Norman Regional. Also following the see, No.4 UCLA and No.5 Utah will represent the Pac-12 conference out of the Los Angeles Regional.
Even with the hosts being the favorites on Saturday, Oklahoma had a scare after having to count a fall in their second rotation. UCLA was also in a very close third place until the final routine of their third rotation turned out to be a perfect-10 from their USA Olympian Jordan Chiles.
No.7 Cal will battle No.2 Florida, No.9 Missouri, and No.15 Arizona State for top spots in the NCAA Championships in Fort Worth, Texas in just under two weeks.
No.2 Florida may or may not be at full strength with their superstar Trinity Thomas picking up a leg injury on Friday and was listed as day-to-day. She stopped her floor routine after the opening tumbling pass and was held out the rest of that meet. With 12 perfect-10s already (all from the floor), Thomas is just one short of tying the NCAA record for most perfect-10s in a collegiate career.
No.9 Michigan State will likely be Cal’s biggest competition. The Spartans had their own issues on Friday, but they have a very impressive season-high score of 198.225. Cal rewrote their history twice this year, with the season-high and program-high of 198.275. Arizona State’s best score this year is only 197.725.
Even with two extra judges looking for deductions in the postseason, teams should be posting their season-best (or close to it) scores in this meet. With no home team, at least the competitors in this regional final do not have to worry about loud cheering for a home team during the very chaotic quad meet with four simultaneous performances for the most part.
For the Cal Bears, they will look to perform closer to their norm of this year, a program-best NQS team score of 197.825. Golden Bears showing uncharacteristic jitters despite no major mistakes, only scored 197.250 on Friday - good enough to still win the Pittsburgh Regional semifinal session 1 but probably would not be good enough on Sunday. Bears underperformed on the always difficult beam and really struggled on vaults with several gymnasts fighting hard to not sit down (which would have been a much bigger deduction).
Coming off a breakout regular season, sophomore Mya Lauzon should be a lot better on two of her three events (beam, bars to go with floor) and score closer to 9.9’s than 9.7’s. The rest of the Cal Bears just need minor adjustments to bump the 9.8’s up to 9.9’s. Friday’s score was the second-lowest of the season, with essentially the same lineup all year long, Cal should rebound with a team score closer to 197.8.
Should Cal extend the season beyond today, they will compete again with their fellow top-two finisher as well as the top-two finishers from the Denver Regional (expected to be No.3 Michigan and No.7 LSU) in one of the NCAA national semifinals on April 13th. A top-two finish to advance to the “Final Four on the Floor” on April 15th will be another historic first for this Cal program that has been steadily rewriting the program history in the past decade.
On the other hand, if the Cal Bears fall short of advancing as a team, the results from Friday across the two sessions will be used to decide the top all-arounder and top individuals in each apparatus to advance to Fort Worth as individual qualifiers. Assuming that Florida in this scenario will advance, eMjae Frazier on Floor (9.95 on Friday) and one of Gabby Perea or Ella Cesario (both 9.95) on bars based on some tiebreaker may represent Cal as individuals.
Cal will be sporting a brand-new leotard today. I have not seen an analysis of leotard vs. scoring, but the shinier the better?
I will be updating this post with scores and results while watching a stream of this meet.
What: NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Pittsburgh Regional Final
No. 7 California vs. No.2 Florida vs. No.9 Missouri vs. No.15 Arizona State
Where: Petersen Events Center (Pittsburgh, PA)
When: 2 PM PT, April 2nd, 2023
Stream: ESPN+
Stats: LINK
If I had correctly interpreted the rules that decide where the teams will start based on the NQS,
Cal will start on Vault → Bars → Beam → Floor
Florida will start on Bars → Beam → Floor → Vault
Missouri will start on Beam → Floor → Vault → Bars
Arizona State will start on Floor → Vault → Bars → Beam
Same starting lineup on paper as most of the season, but Coach Howells called an audible and changed the vault lineup on Friday.
Florida’s Trinity Thomas will not compete today.
Rotation 1: Cal on Vault
Andi Li (9.800) - tiny hop on landing but a solid start
Maddie Williams (9.875) - another hit routine (9.95 starting value)
Casey Brown (9.800) - slight hop back but more power rather than under (9.95 starting value)
Nevaeh DeSouza (9.850) - Yurchenko 1.5 with a slight hop on landing
Mya Lauzon (9.850) - another hop forward on landing but another solid vault and create zero pressure for Frazier who could post a big score
eMjae Frazier (9.900) - Yurchenko double twist, small hop on landing but a great execution on a tough vault (10.0 starting value)
Cal Team Score: 49.275, already much better than Friday when Cal posted sub 49 in this rotation. Vault is arguably Cal’s weakest rotation (NQS of 49.3700), the Bears just got to perform up to their normal level in the rest of this meet.
Team Standings: Florida 49.575 (bars), Michigan State 49.425 (beam), Arizona State 49.300 (floor), Cal 49.275
A strong rotation by Michigan State on the always tricky beam. Cal cannot expect other squads to underperform.
Rotation 2: Cal on Bars
Nevaeh DeSouza (9.875) - a hit routine with a great landing, just what Cal needed from the senior
eMjae Frazier (9.925) - got the stick on her tougher dismount
Gabby Perea (9.875) - slight hop back on the landing, worse score than on Friday
Andi Li (9.900) - a feather-light landing to cap a great routine
Maddie Williams (9.95) - a much-needed great score for the always-dependable Maddie
Ella Cesario (9.850) - slight hop back on landing to be Cal’s weakest score of this rotation
Cal Team Score: 49.525 (again, a slight drop from the NQS of 49.575)
Team Standings: Florida 99.175, Michigan State 98.900, Cal 98.800, ASU 98.750
ASU had a fantastic vault rotation with multiple 9.9+’s. This will make them competitive for that 2nd berth.
Cal is capable of a big 49.6 score on beam. Michigan State is solid but not great on vault (NQS of 49.380).
Rotation 3: Cal on Beam
Nevaeh DeSouza (9.90) - whatever jitters that were there on Friday are gone today, should beat the 9.85 from the other day
Michigan State got a mediocre 9.7 vault to start this very important rotation.
Maddie Williams (9.90) - another great routine for Maddie, Cal looks like they want to grab that ticket to Fort Worth!
Florida has an out-of-bound on floor.
Andi Li (9.90) - another hit routine, roll on you Bears!
eMjae Frazier (9.95) - great routine by the freshman, should be another big score
Mya Lauzon (9.95) - this looks similar to her 10.0 routine earlier this season but probably won’t get a perfect score here
Gabby Perea (9.95) - another near-perfect routine, Cal will likely drop a 9.9 score
Cal Team Score: 49.65! This is what Cal Women’s Gymnastics is about!
Team Standings: Florida 148.500, Cal 148.450, Arizona State 148.250, Michigan State 148.125
Obviously, Cal can’t rest yet. It’s still a very close meet with all four teams still in it.
Rotation 4: Cal on Floor
Nevaeh DeSouza (9.90) - a solid routine, hopefully not yet the last for Cal senior
Florida has a sitdown on vault! Don’t think they can advance if they count a fall.
Gabby Perea (9.875) - another great routine, Cal will finish knowing what score they need to advance
Maddie Williams (9.90) - another hit
Florida does hit on the rest of their vaults to likely advance with a score 197.800.
Very strong Michigan State rotation on bars to apply some pressure. Spartans got 197.650.
Andi Li (9.90) - the junior hit on her routine
Mya Lauzon (9.95) - just a solid score here and Lauzon will clinch a Cal NCAA Championship berth!
Cal Bears take this meet!!!!
eMjae Frazier (9.975) - this is just a coronation for Frazier
Cal Team Score: 49.625!!
Team Standings: Cal 198.075, Florida 197.800, Michigan State 197.650, Arizona State 197.475
GO BEARS!
Cal Women's Gymnastics wins Pittsburgh Regional! (Live Blog)
Go Bears! This team is everything.
And thanks for covering women's gymnastics. As the sport grows, and as Cal wgym keeps rising, it would be great to see coverage of the sport that includes more analysis of the actual routines (like the elements that athletes compete, composition requirements, possible deductions, judging splits, etc.) rather than just telling us about the dismounts, the score, or a "hit". Live blogs like Balance Beam Situation or College Gym News do that work for all of the NCAA but can't focus on Cal. We have a really excellent team and it would be cool to see you cover it so that unfamiliar audiences know why we do.
Also, Trinity Thomas from Florida has 27 perfect 10s, not 12. And she has perfect 10s on all four apparatuses, not just floor. https://balancebeamsituation.com/2019/12/02/all-time-10-0-rankings/
GO BEARS!!!