If you feel like you’ve seen this film with LSU gymnastics before, you’d be right, given that the Tigers made it all the way to the semifinal round of nationals last year.
However, despite a shaky second and third rotation for the Tigers, there are many key differences when fans compare this team’s nationals performance to last year’s.
“I know everybody has a little bit of PTSD from last year, when we did kind of similar things,” LSU head coach Jay Clark said. “And so now we’ve got that put to bed, and hopefully we can get some rest and get back in here Saturday and do the thing.”
While LSU may have led this year’s competition in first place following its vault rotation with a 49.4750, it dropped to third as it closed out the third rotation on balance beam.
If you’re looking at last year’s semifinal loss from the perspective of the scores, it could be argued that the Tigers were in a better position as they finished the third rotation in second place, just behind UCLA.
However, given the complexity of gymnastics, a team’s performance shouldn’t be compared based on its scores, but rather its mindset, and that mindset is what united this team and its leaders, which was this year’s key to success for LSU.
As it entered this season, LSU knew some changes had to be made, and its gymnasts took accountability for that, as senior Ashley Cowan said earlier this week.
“We attacked relationships differently,” Cowan said. “And so we kind of audited last year’s season. And we’re like, ‘Okay, the relationship needs to be better this year. We’re gonna be stronger. We need to act as a unit every time that we’re out there, whether it’s a practice or we’re in competition.’”
In the name of acting as a unit, this team turned to some of its leaders on Thursday night, shifting the priority from themselves to every single one of their other teammates.
An example of that kind of leader was all-around sophomore Kailin Chio, who made sure that her team wasn’t going to end up in the same position as last year.
“I circled up the team after beam, and I just, you know, told them, like, we’re not gonna do this again,” Chio said. “So like, let’s get our pedal to the medal. And, you know, I knew this team could do it. And we went out there, we did the exact floor rotation that we needed.”
Chio’s leadership is just one example of how LSU managed to get in the right headspace to push through the final rotation of the evening, with junior Konnor McClain stepping up as well.
After pushing through a minor injury and delivering a series of composed routines, McClain’s teammates were able to turn to her in their time of need and deliver a meet-winning rotation on the floor exercise.
“We have a saying, it’s ‘with each other, for each other,’” McClain said. “And I think when I do my gymnastics, I really take that into consideration, and that’s really just what I think about every single time I go out there and compete our gymnastics.”
If you were tuned into last year’s meet, you’d know that when LSU tripped over itself during the fourth rotation, it wasn’t able to get back up, but that wasn’t the case this year, given that the program managed to bounce back from its errors.
Clark said that his team’s performance on the uneven bars and balance beam was not what he was expecting, but at the end of the day, the team managed to “survive it,” guaranteeing them a spot in Saturday’s competition.
“My hope, my prayer for them every time we walk out there is not necessarily that we win,” Clark said, “We don’t want to have any regrets. It’s about them competing at or near the best of their ability, and whatever that is.”
