Gymnastics Headed to NCAA Athens Regional
3/21/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Gymnastics
East Lansing, Mich. -- Michigan State will travel to Athens, Georgia to compete at the 2016 NCAA Regional Championships as announced during the selection show late Monday afternoon. MSU is among the 36 schools selected to compete at regionals and enters the postseason as the No. 6 seed in the Athens Region along with LSU, Oregon State, Arizona, George Washington, and host Georgia. This marks the Spartans' 17th overall appearance in an NCAA Regional in program history.
The Spartans, who rank 36th in the country with a 195.38 regional qualifying score, will be competing as a team at the regional championships for the second straight year. Michigan State is coming off of a seventh-place finish at the 2016 Big Ten Championships in Lincoln, Neb. - marking its highest finish at Big Tens since 2013, while MSU's team score of 195.475 was its best at the Big Ten Championships since scoring a 195.65 in 2009.
As a team, the Spartans' strongest rotations were their final two, scoring a season-best 49.000 on vault and a 49.400 on floor exercise. The 49.400 on floor tied for the eighth-best performance in the Spartan record book: MSU has posted a 49.475 five times, (most recently in 2004) and has twice posted a 49.425. The Spartans posted a 49.4 score last February at Illinois. Additionally, the team vault score (49.000) was tied for 24th in the MSU record book.
Lisa Burt (Port Orange, Fla.) leads the Spartans in all-around competition this season, ranking fifth in the Central region and 11th in the Big Ten with a 39.265 RQS. Junior Elena Lagoski (Kingston, Penn.) is tied for 24th nationally on floor exercise (9.905 RQS) and finished second at the Big Ten Championships last weekend, scoring a career-best 9.95. Both Burt and Lagoski are Second Team All-Big Ten selections, and Lagoski was named to the Big Ten All-Championship team along with sophomore Hailee Westney (Milton, Ontario) who tied for third with her career-best 9.90 on bars.
Last year in Ames, Iowa, the Spartans tallied a 195.375, finishing fourth behind LSU, Nebraska and Denver who went 197.175-196.950-195.950. MSU finished ahead of Iowa State's 195.350 and Washington's 193.675. LSU and Nebraska advanced to nationals from the Ames region.
The top 18 teams are seeded on a national basis, based on RQS. Teams 19-36 are organized into three pods (19-24, 25-30 and 31-36) and placed geographically at each of the six sites, beginning with teams 19-24 followed by teams 25-30 and then finally teams 31-36. All-around competitors and event specialists are assigned to their respective geographic region or the designated site for their region.
