Back For More: Gators Set Sights On Gymnastics' Top Prize
Thursday, April 14, 2011 | Gymnastics, Scott Carter
(GatorZone.com Senior Writer Scott Carter will travel to Cleveland and report from the NCAA Championships starting Friday evening. Follow Carter on Twitter at @GatorZoneScott or follow @GatorZoneGym).
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Now that the time is here, the message is clear.
Forget last year. Forget last month. Forget last week.
That is the approach the Florida gymnastics team packed with it for a trip to Cleveland and the NCAA Championships starting Friday. The Gators aren't suffering from amnesia, but if they were, it would be fine with them.
“What we're asking is that they just go out and stay focused on the present moment,'' Florida coach Rhonda Faehn said.
There's a reason for the singular message.
A year ago, the Gators entered the NCAA Championships as the No. 2 overall seed, prompting many to wonder if 2010 was finally the year that the Fearsome Foursome's grip on the national title trophy would end.
Not only did the Gators have a team many considered capable of snapping Georgia's five-year run of national titles, but they had the home-floor advantage with the event being held at the O'Connell Center for the third time in history and first time since 1997.
The storyline got a lot of play.
You see, since the NCAA Gymnastics Championships started in 1982, four schools have dominated the field. Georgia has won 10 national titles, followed by Utah (nine), UCLA (six) and Alabama (four). That's it. There has been no Cinderella to sneak in dressed in a leotard.
So if the host Gators won, they would be the newest member of a very small fraternity.
Of course, if you're reading this closely, you've probably guessed by now that the Gators stumbled toward a possible national title, finishing fifth. They were in their locker room shaking their heads at how a slow start on the bars cost them crucial points as Faehn's alma mater, UCLA, claimed its first national title since 2004.
The Fearsome Foursome remained intact for at least another year. And to no one's surprise, UCLA, Georgia, Utah and Alabama are in Cleveland too for another shot at an NCAA title. The finals start Friday and run through Sunday at the Wolstein Center on the campus of Cleveland State University.
The Gators are back, too, and while the setting is different from a year ago, the mindset is the same. They want to win and crack that exclusive club.
“Last year, we thought it was our time,'' said sixth-year senior Maranda Smith said. “And this year, we feel the same. It's just a matter of going out there and doing what we can do. Hopefully if we do that, we end up on top.''
The Gators were ranked No. 1 in the country for most of the season and defeated Alabama at home and Georgia on the road. However, as the injuries began to mount late in the season, the Gators took a tumble at Arkansas in late February, and then the defending SEC champions finished second at conference finals last month.
Florida earned its 11th consecutive trip to the NCAA Finals on April 2 by squeaking by Boise State by 0.025 points at the North Central Region meet in Denver, finishing second to the Razorbacks.
With two weeks to prepare for NCAA Championships, the Gators worked on getting their bodies and minds healthy.
Faehn likes the way her team has responded.
“It's here and we are really excited,'' Faehn said. “We have had really great training since we came back from regional. We are going to leave there with no regrets. They are going to compete with their hearts, they are going to put it all out on the line and they are going to compete with everything they have.
“There is so much that we really want to accomplish as a team. It's not just the final result – it's the journey and every step that each athlete has taken and how much they have grown and how much they have achieved so far this season. We are really trying to keep focused on the 36 inches in front of us.''
Faehn and others who experienced last year's disappointment have shared the same message with key newcomers such as freshmen Mackenzie Caquatto and Alaina Johnson. The Gators will need both to score well to win their first national title.
The same was true a year ago for then-freshmen Marissa King and Ashanee Dickerson. While King and Dickerson had their moments – King finished with a team-best 39.40 all-around score and Dickerson posted a 9.85 on the bars during the Super Six – each had missteps that cost Florida critical points.
King is optimistic that the team is approaching this year's meet in a much better state of mind compared to the added pressure of being at home a year ago.
“Last year's experience was something I never expected at all,'' King said. “I'm not thinking about winning, winning, winning. I think we made that mistake last time – that we focused on winning and we didn't focus on what we need to do to get that great result.
“There is always going to be pressure, because obviously we were ranked No. 1 for most of the season. We are not going to put that pressure on ourselves and let that affect us. When we go out there and have fun and perform our routines like the way we can do, we produce great results.''
To help the cause, the Gators are healthier than they were at the regional meet. Smith's Achilles tendinitis isn't hurting as badly, and Caquatto's ankle injury is feeling better according to Faehn.
Florida's best performance at the NCAA Finals came in 1998 when the Gators finished runner-up to Georgia in Los Angeles. The Gators had finished in the top four for four years in a row until dropping to fifth last year.
In her final season, Smith can't think of a better ending to her career than hoisting a national championship trophy over her head. She didn't expect to be here before being granted a sixth year of eligibility late last summer, but now that she is, she has tunnel vision.
She hopes her teammates have the same.
“I told them to go out there and focus on what we've been doing as a team and not to change anything,'' Smith said. “Treat it just as if we are at a home meet. This is the kind of team that we have personalities that when they have fun, and try to enjoy the moment rather than worry about the outcome, they definitely do better in the end.''
