Birmingham, Ala. – The No. 12 LSU gymnastics team finished fourth for the third straight year at the Southeastern Conference Championships in Birmingham’s Bartow Arena, scoring 195.650.
“I thought we did a great job [Saturday],” said head coach D-D Breaux. “We did what we were capable of. Obviously, we made a few mistakes that we need to get corrected, but I’m happy with the overall performance.”
With the efforts of their final floor competitor, Ashley Miles, Alabama squeaked by with a victory over Georgia that tied the narrowest margin of victory in a SEC gymnastics championship 197.575 – 197.525. Miles scored a near perfect 9.975 on floor.
LSU went into the final rotation trailing Florida by .025.
Two falls on the uneven bars prevented the Tigers from taking third as Florida scored 195.850, defeating the Tigers by two-tenths of a point. Senior Brook Cazeaux and sophomore Annie Gagnon fell after a mistake on their release moves.
“Two people with experience lost it and that bothers me,” Breaux said.
LSU avenged an earlier loss to Auburn as it placed fifth scoring 195.025 while Arkansas and Kentucky tied for last, posting scores of 194.875.
Because of the site’s proximity to Georgia and Alabama, the vast majority of the 6,322 in attendance donned red clothing cheering for either the Crimson Tide or the GymDogs.
“It was your typical SEC non-neutral site competition,” Breaux said. “The momentum went with Georgia and Alabama from the beginning, and the judges went along with it. It didn’t go anybody else’s way all night.”
Junior Lindsay Beddow said the team was prepared for the scoring not to favor them.
“We just focused on not letting the scores get us down and focused on what we needed to do,” Beddow said. “Because the scoring was absurd.”
Sophomore Jade Jenkins said many times teams such as Alabama and Georgia get high scores even though they do not necessarily deserve them because of the reputations of their gymnastics program.
“We had it on our mindset that we would have to earn everything we get,” Jenkins said.
The Tigers began the meet by performing on beam.
Beddow said competing on beam at SEC takes more focus than a regular meet.
Beddow was the first Tiger to compete and said she felt pressured to perform well.
“It’s totally different,” Beddow said. “It was more pressure then I felt in my life.”
Beddow scored 9.725 on beam while freshman April Burkholder led the team, posting a 9.875. LSU ended the event with a score of 48.900.
The Tigers used their next event, floor, to place them in third place scoring 49.250. Burkholder led the team with the third-highest floor exercise score of the competition, 9.900.
“We did our best floor routine of the year,” Beddow said. “But the scores didn’t reflect it.”
The Tigers matched their beam score on the vault with Burkholder and fellow freshmen Terin Martinjak and Rikki L’Heureux leading the way, scoring 9.800.
LSU’s fall on bars caused them to finish last in the event, but Burkholder and sophomore Katherine Hilton tied for 4th on the event with scores of 9.875.
Hilton had not been in the lineup since falling March 7 against Georgia and was the last Tiger to compete.
“It feels great,” Hilton said. “I just had to calm down and do my routine.”
Following the competition, the SEC coaches voted on SEC freshman and SEC gymnast of the year.
Burkholder became the first Tiger in history to be recognized as SEC freshman of the year. Her sister Ashley received the same award in 1998 as a Kentucky Wildcat.
“It felt good,” Burkholder said. “Freshman of the year is just something recognizing that I progressed each week through the season.”
Added Hilton:”We’re going to learn from this meet and build on it for regionals.”