The No. 7 LSU gymnastics team (3-0, 1-0 Southeastern Conference) stayed undefeated as the Tigers beat No. 20 Kentucky on Friday in the PMAC during the first ever “Pink and Blue” Meet, 196.575-195.100.
LSU held the lead from the first rotation on. The Tigers finished vault with a 49.375, seeing career highs from juniors Sydney Ewing and Ashleigh Gnat, who scored a 9.975 and a perfect 10, respectively.
“That’s what we do,” said LSU coach D-D Breaux. “In practice, we’ll put [Ewing] in a pressured situation and tell her, ‘if you hit this, we win the national championship.’”
Gnat’s double Yurchenko also marked the first perfect 10.000 of the Tigers 2016 season and made it clear why the team ranks first in the nation on vault.
After tying the fourth-highest score in the league on bars in their last meet against North Carolina State University, the Tigers were off to a troubling start Friday, when Gnat couldn’t hold a handstand, and received a 9.350.
But strong performances from sophomore all-arounder Myia Hambrick and senior all-arounder Jessica Savona brought momentum back and created the best atmosphere possible for freshman all-arounder Lexie Priessman to make her LSU bars-debut rememberable. After sticking her double layout, Priessman set the event-high, 9.925.
“It was absolutely amazing,” Priessman said. “I could hear everyone cheering for me and it didn’t even feel like there were 10,000 people around me.”
The Tigers saw their second fall in freshman all-arounder Sarah Finnegan’s bars routine. Though the score was the team’s lowest and therefore did not count, her 9.300 also provided positives.
“That builds team character,” Breaux said. “That you can have a fall and it doesn’t affect the people after you. This team is destined to be great.”
From there on, it was all LSU. 
While the Wildcats seemed to rely on a safer difficulty in their performances, LSU avoided falls in their final rotations, beam and floor, and secured the victory.
When Gnat’s floor routine came to a close and all you heard was ”10” being yelled from the seats, the Tigers’ SEC opener served as a great display of the team’s potential. 
“They’re such a great crowd,” Breaux said. “For them to get settled in, to cheer and be gratified when there’s a great performance throughout the entire night is like being a football game.”
You can reach Markus Hufner on Twitter @Hufner_TDR