Fresh off a season-high score of 197.3 and ranked back at No. 10, the LSU gymnastics team is back at home for a meet against Kentucky today at 7 p.m.
Sophomore gymnast Brittany Brown needs to be more consistent for the Tigers if they expect to keep those high scores in upcoming meets. She competes in the vault and floor lineups. Coach D-D Breaux said Brown needs to step up a notch.
“I would never tell Brittany Brown she is where I think she needs to be,” Breaux said. “Brittany Brown always needs to be pushed to go to the next level. She always needs to be pushed to work harder and to be better. Her self image is not nearly as good as what I think she is capable of achieving. Although she’s doing well, she’s certainly not performing at her best.”
Brown said she wants to be more consistent.
“I expect to step up a notch and be more consistent than what I am,” Brown said. “At least 9.9 on floor, and on vault, I expect to definitely do better.”
Brown’s teammate, April Burkholder, said Brown is one of the more consistent performers on the team.
“I don’t think Brittany has a problem with consistency,” Burkholder said. “The past meets on vault she’s been getting better and better each weekend and on floor she landed short on one landing and she’s blowing that up. She progresses each weekend especially on vault and floor’s good. She doesn’t really [make] any mistakes.”
Breaux said even though the 197.3 was great, things might be different this time around.
“You can’t expect that from [the team] every time because you have a different set of judges, different set of circumstances every time,” Breaux said. “What might be a 9.9 performance one night, the same performance for a different judge might be a 9.85 or a 9.8. It just depends on what that judge sees and how they evaluate that routine.”
Kentucky is 1-9 on the season with a Southeastern Conference record of 0-4. The Gym-Cats’ season average is a 194.193 and they do not average above a 48.936 in any event.
Breaux said Kentucky does not look good on paper, but she expects them to give the team a good competition.
“I think they’ll put up stiff competition because traditionally teams come into the PMAC and have the best meet of their season,” Breaux said. “That’s just what happens, I don’t know why it happens here, but traditionally that’s generally what has happened with those teams throughout the SEC so I would expect Kentucky to come in here and have the performance of their lives.”
Breaux said being back in the Top 10 is a good position for the team and she would like to go up a little further by working smarter, not harder.
“I don’t think we can do more work,” Breaux said. “We can’t do more conditioning and we’re certainly not going to do more difficulty. What we can do more of is do the things that we do better. We need to be smarter in our quest, smarter day to day, take advantage of those light days and really be smart, know when to rest and know when to press.”
After Kentucky, the Tigers face rematches with two teams in a triangular meet in Denton, Texas, Monday night. Texas Woman’s University finished last at the triangular meet in the PMAC on Jan. 31, while Arizona finished first at the Michigan State Invitational right in front of the Tigers.
Breaux said she’s more worried about the big picture rather than one meet specifically.
“I think we’re a more seasoned team,” Breaux said “I knew when the season began that this team would be a work in progress. Most of our lineups are filled with freshmen and sophomores [making] us a pretty inexperienced team, but I think we’re very talented and the fact that the University of Arizona beat us early is insignificant to the big picture.”