The No. 3 LSU gymnastics team will attempt to hoist the SEC Championship trophy up for the third year in a row come Saturday at the Smoothie King Center in New Orleans.
The Tigers earned the No. 1 seed for a third-straight year and will compete in the evening session at the championships. LSU will rotate in Olympic order as the No. 1 seed beginning on vault and go to bars, beam and wrap up on floor. No. 8 Georgia, No. 9 Kentucky, and No. 3 Florida will also compete in the evening session. Alabama, Auburn, Arkansas and Missouri will compete in the first session.
While the Tigers have a history of dominating during the SEC, they have to face teams that they lost to early on in the season such as the Auburn Tigers, the Florida Gators, and the Kentucky Wildcats.
The Tigers started out rough as they lost their first two SEC meets of the season. They picked the intensity up as they went on to beat all other teams they competed against with exception of the Kentucky Wildcats.
After this rough start, the Tigers have proven their abilities and talent as they are ranked No.3 in the nation and were given a No. 1 seed for the SEC championship.
Just like in many other sports, the Florida Gators might be the Tigers biggest competition. The Tigers not only lost to the gators in their regular season matchup, but the Gators are ranked a place above the Tigers with having a 197.579 average.The Tigers sit one spot under the Gators as they have a 197.198 average.
The Tigers and Gators also both have gymnasts who are finalists for the AAI Award. For the Tigers, senior all-arounder Sarah Finnegan is a finalist. Finnegan is a 15 time all-American, and the reigning SEC gymnast of the year. For the Gators, senior all-arounder Alicia Boren is the AAI finalist. Boren is a 14 time all-American and a three- time All-SEC gymnast.
This SEC championship will be one for the books as half of the nation’s top-10 teams — No. 3 LSU, No. 4 Florida, No. 8 Georgia, No. 9 Kentucky, No. 10 Alabama — are among the eight-team SEC field. Being the powerhouse conference of college gymnastics, all SEC fans are in for a showing of gymnastics at its best.
The competition will begin Saturday in the Smoothie King Center. The warm ups for the first session will begin at 1:20pm and will be televised on the SEC Network, while the warm ups for session two will start at 5:25 p.m. and will be shown on ESPN2.
