Florida celebrates with freshman Sloane Blakely after her first collegiate 10.0. The Gators and Auburn tied at 198.575 - the nation's high for 2022 and tied for No. 4 all-time in NCAA history.
No. 3 Gators Claim SEC Title Outright with Tie at No. 6 Auburn
AUBURN, Ala. – For the second consecutive season, Florida finished regular-season league action with a trip to the state of Alabama to decide if the Gators would retain sole possession of the Southeastern Conference title or share the championship with its opponent.
In one of the nation's top gymnastics duals of the weekend, No. 3 Florida tied No. 6 Auburn at 198.575 – a school record for both programs and the nation's high for 2022.
With the tie, Florida claims sole possession of the 2022 SEC regular-season title with its 0.929 winning percentage. Heading into tonight's SEC finale, Auburn needed a win to share the title with Florida.
It was the first official event at the Neville Arena, which was renamed from Auburn Arena earlier Friday afternoon. And the sold-out crowd saw quite a competition:
School record team totals for each team
Fourth highest team score in collegiate history
Four perfect 10.0s by four different gymnasts
Tonight's tie gives 🐊🤸 sole possession of its 4⃣th consecutive @SEC regular-season title!
FOURTH CONSECUTIVE SEC TITLE:
Tonight's tie gives Florida its third consecutive undefeated SEC regular-season title at 6-0-1. The 2020 Gator team was the program's first to post a 7-0 league record and repeated with a 7-0 record in 2021.
The league began awarding a SEC regular-season trophy in 2017. This is Florida's fourth consecutive SEC regular-season title: 2019 (6-1), 2020 (7-0), 2021 (7-0) and 2022 (6-0-1).
SEC Standings (through March 4 competition)
School
SEC Record
Overall
Florida
6-0-1
10-0-1
Auburn
5-1-1
8-1-1
LSU
4-3
8-3
Kentucky
4-3
7-3
Alabama
4-3
6-4
Missouri
3-4
8-4
Georgia
1-6
3-7
Arkansas
0-7
2-7
March 4-6 SEC Schedule (3) Florida (198.575) at (6) Auburn (198.575)
(11) Missouri (197.225) at Georgia (196.600)
Arkansas (196.00) at (7) Alabama (198.075)
((10) Kentucky (197.50) at (5) LSU (197.45)
FLORIDA IN HIGH SCORING MEETS:
There's been nine dual meets in NCAA history that both teams turned in a score that started with a 198.
Florida's been in six of the last eight:
Date
First Place
Score
Second Place
Score
3/4/22
No. 3 Florida
198.575
@No. 6 Auburn
198.575
2/12/21
No. 1 Florida
198.15
@No. 2 LSU
198.05
2/23/20
No. 3 Utah
198.075
@ No. 4 UCLA
198.025
2/1/19
@ No. 1 Oklahoma
198.350
No. 2 Florida
198.025
1/28/18
@ No. 5 Florida
198.150
No. 1 Oklahoma
198.125
3/6/15
@ No. 1 Oklahoma
198.50
No. 3 Florida
198.10
3/14/04
@ No. 13 Nebraska
198.00
No. 9 Iowa State
198.00
3/12/04
No. 1 UCLA
198.250
@ No. 7 Florida
198.225
2/16/03
No. 1 UCLA
198.400
@ No. 7 Arizona State
198.150
shading denotes a tie
THIS EVENING'S MEET:
The Gators started on uneven bars and the two all-around medalists from the most recent Olympics and World Championships – Florida's Leanne Wong (2021 World Championships all-around silver) and Auburn's Sunisa Lee (2020 Olympic all-around gold) shared the bars title at 9.95.
The Gators set a program record on vault as no score lower than 9.9 was used toward the total of 49.725. Senior Trinity Thomas earned her second career vault 10.0 to win the event title.
Florida got another 10.0 on their next event. Freshman Sloane Blakely anchored the floor lineup with her first collegiate 10.0. She shared the evening's event title with Auburn's Derrian Gobourne. Senior Nya Reed shared third with AU's Sophia Groth and Lee as all posted near perfect 9.975s.
Balance beam was UF's closing event and the Gators were led by Thomas' 9.975. That mark took second in the beam standings to Lee's 10.0. Wong shared third at 9.95 with AU's Gabby McLaughlin and Groth.
Lee won the all-around at 39.80. Florida senior Megan Skaggs was runner-up with her collegiate high of 39.725. Florida celebrates when 10.0 is shown for Trinity Thomas' vault. It was the first of two 10.0s for the Gators as freshman Sloane Blakely earned her first 10.0 on floor exercise.
GATOR PERFORMANCE NOTES:
This was the fourth consecutive marquee meet for Florida. On Feb. 11, then No. 4 Florida defeated No. 5 Louisiana State (198.15-197.825), won at No. 10 Kentucky 197.575-197.35 on Feb. 18 and last Friday won 198.10 – 197.75 over No. 2 Oklahoma.
Florida leads with four appearances among the nation's top 10 team totals of 2022: No. T1 198.575, No. 6 198.25, No. 9 198.15 and No. 10 198.10.
The Gators traveled to the state of Alabama to close SEC action for the last two seasons and in both cases, a win by the host would have given them a share of the league's regular-season title. Florida defeated Alabama 197.425 – 197.225 in 2021 and tied Auburn tonight.
Thomas leads all of the nation's competitors with six 10.0s in 2022 (three floor, two vault & one beam).
That's 14 10.0s for Thomas in her Gator career – six floor, three bars & beam, two vault
Florida's 10 perfect scores leads the nation in 2022. Next is Oklahoma and Utah with six 10.0s.
Ten 10.0s by four different Gators are both program highs.
Thomas and Sloane weren't the only Gators with perfect scores Friday. Skaggs earned the maximum of 9.95 for her Yurchenko full to set her collegiate vault best.
With her vault win Friday, Thomas now shares Florida's career event wins record of 95 victories with Gator Great Bridget Sloan.
Of the nine different Gators to earn a floor exercise 10.0, Blakely is the only freshman.
This was Reed's 21st consecutive floor routine earning a 9.925 or better.
This was Florida's fifth meet competing in front of a sell-out crowd this season. The Gators sold out their final four home meets and tonight's meet at Auburn was a sellout.
COACH ROWLAND SAID:
"We couldn't have written the script for a night like this. So extremely proud of the Gators in their presence and their commitment to following through in everything we've been working on in training. The Gators got better today.
"It was an exciting environment. Very electrifying. Maybe not for the Gators but still, this crowd was unbelievable. The Gators just kept owning their gymnastics. They kept stepping up. They kept showing up and kept fighting and I couldn't ask for anything more.
"It was a great step in the process of our season as we prepare for postseason. We are going to enjoy the moment and get back in the gym on Monday and get ready for some work." " – Florida Head Coach Jenny Rowland
