Gymnasts Headed To Tuscaloosa
3/26/2018 12:00:00 AM | Gymnastics
Andy Sneddon, CMUChippewas.com
MOUNT PLEASANT, Mich. - Just two days after a historic performance at the Mid-American Conference Championships, the Central Michigan gymnastics team learned on Monday its next destination.
The Chippewas are headed to Tuscaloosa, Ala. for an NCAA Regional on Saturday, April 7. CMU is one of 36 teams selected to partake in six regionals across the country. The Chippewas will join the host Crimson Tide, Michigan, Georgia, Missouri and Illinois in the regional.
Alabama is ranked sixth, Michigan is seventh, and Georgia is ranked 18th.
"Tuscaloosa is a great venue, it'll be an exciting audience … they just make that place vibrate," CMU coach Jerry Reighard said. "And we're really excited to be there."
It marks the 10th consecutive year - and 15th time overall -- that the Chippewas have received a regional invitation. The top two teams at each regional advance to the NCAA Championships, which are scheduled for April 20-21 in St. Louis.
"The whole basis of our program is No. 1 to win the conference, and No. 2 is to make that (NCAA Regional) appearance, and every time that we make that appearance it gives us that much better of a recruiting advantage and that has continued to help us build the program throughout the years," Reighard said. "It is the expectation and we explain that to our recruits when they come in the door that this is something that we've built and we take pride in."
CMU is coming off a win on Saturday at the MAC Championships, during which it posted a 197.025 score, the third-highest in program history and the Chippewas' best score since it posted a 197.525 in the 2004 MAC Championships.
CMU opened the season with a 196.375 which had been its season high until Saturday's incredible performance at McGuirk Arena.
The Chippewas, as the sixth seed at Tuscaloosa, will go in Olympic order - vault, bars, beam and floor. It's the same order they follow when they compete at home.
"Olympic order is the envy of every gymnastics team," Reighard said. "We were just at MAC Championships, competed in that order, so the comfort level is there. You spend a lot of time rehearsing if you don't have that order and we don't have to (rehearse), which gives us more time to prep for the important things."