Back on Familiar Ground, Gators Face Familiar Foes

ST. LOUIS – In the aftermath of Friday night's national semifinals, Florida senior Alex McMurtry stood in a sea of glittering gymnasts buzzing around her, pondering what the Gators just did and what they have a chance to do.

The first day of the NCAA Championships was over and the Gators accomplished their mission on Friday, advancing to the Super Six for the seventh consecutive year, which is the longest active streak in the country.

Florida's score of 197.5875 was enough for second behind two-time defending national champion Oklahoma (198.0500). The Gators were good on Friday, their score better than any of the three teams (UCLA, LSU, Nebraska) from the first semifinal session to advance.

They will try to be great on Saturday night at Chaifetz Arena.

"It's the national championship. It's the ultimate stage,'' McMurtry said. "But if you treat it like that, you are going to throw it away. You just have to treat it like a normal day in the gym, a normal competition, and hope for the best. We had this great momentum [Friday] and we were on a roll, but that was not our best gymnastics."

Florida head coach Jenny Rowland agreed with her standout senior's assessment, saying the Gators left some points on the floor, but overall, Rowland said her team had "a really fantastic setup" for Saturday night's final event of the season.

The Gators' strongest performance Friday came on vault, led by McMurtry's 9.9375. McMurtry shared the individual national vault title with Utah's MyKayla Skinner and Oklahoma's Brenna Dowell.

Florida seeks to be better on the beam and floor routine. Following a slow start on floor, junior Alicia Boren (9.900) and freshman Alyssa Baumann (9.950) finished fast and furious to close out perhaps their most difficult challenge to close the gap on Oklahoma.

Since the loss of senior Kennedy Baker late in the season due to a torn Achilles' tendon, Baumann has taken over as anchor on floor and she delivered in a big way Friday.

"I knew that we had a mistake earlier in the lineup so I just wanted to go out and do the best floor routine I could,'' said Baumann, competing in her first NCAA Championships. "It was kind of like icing on the cake that I got third place in the floor. I thought if somebody had a little mistake here or there, we had each other's backs."

The most intriguing storyline around Saturday's finals is the trio of Florida, Oklahoma and LSU.

A year ago, Oklahoma repeated as national champion with LSU finishing second and Florida a close third. Both the Tigers and Sooners visited Exactech Arena during the regular season as the No. 1-ranked team in the country. The Gators lost narrowly to LSU, but behind a spectacular performance by McMurtry (a pair of 10s), they edged the Sooners in front of more than 9,500 fans.

Rowland's message heading into the finals is the same as on Friday.

"It's the best of the best,'' she said. "You've got your best friends slash best rivals out on the competition floor and it's 'game on.' Everybody is out to win a national championship. Anything can happen in gymnastics. We'll see in the end what happens. We can only control the controllables. That's our team, that's our energy, that's our focus, that's all the little details we've been working on in the gym."

In what has become one of college athletics' top rivalries in recent years, the Gators and Sooners have dominated the Super Six since 2013. Florida won its first national title five years ago, shared the 2014 title with the Sooners, and won a third consecutive title in 2015. Meanwhile, the Sooners won in 2016 and again last season with a lineup anchored by dynamic sophomore Maggie Nichols.

The tension will be high in front of a live national television audience on ESPNU.

"I don't know that you ever feel at ease when you know you're fighting to do things like this,'' Oklahoma coach K.J. Kindler said. "You know there's a lot at stake."

For Florida, Saturday's Super Six serves as sort of bridge from the past to the future.

Seniors McMurtry, Baker and Grace McLaughlin are the only members remaining from Florida's last national title team. Meanwhile, Baumann is one of the stars of the future and showed her potential on the national stage Friday.

She may be new to college gymnastics, but Baumann understands how close the Gators are to the ultimate prize.

"I know that we all just really want it so bad,'' she said. "It's like a burning fire inside of us, so we're ready just to let it out tomorrow and do the best we can. We know what we're capable of and that's a lot."

Added McMurtry: "Every year I feel like it gets harder to win a national championship. I'm excited. I know we beat Oklahoma before. We beat LSU before. We can do this if we have nothing but confidence in each other."

The Gators will need confidence and more to claim their first title under Rowland. They need to be clean and improve their scores on beam and floor. They need to pick each other up like on Friday.

Oklahoma may be the favorite, but Rowland, a former Sooners assistant, liked the way the Gators responded Friday. If they can be super on Saturday, anything can happen.

"We are going to repeat what we did [Friday] and focus on the little details but not pay too much attention to thing that we have to correct here and correct there, because sometimes that's just a mental overload,'' she said. "It's a clean slate. That's the great thing about the Super Six. It's a clean slate and you can come back in and start all over."

Gators Calendar

Back on Familiar Ground, Gators Face Familiar Foes

Players Mentioned

Kennedy Baker

Alyssa Baumann

Alicia Boren

Grace McLaughlin

Alex McMurtry

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