April 15, 2011

Cleveland, OH - The UCLA gymnastics team will have the same draw in the NCAA Super Six Team Finals Saturday (1 pm PT) as it did in the semifinals on Friday, starting on a bye before floor exercise and ending on balance beam. The Bruins will be vying for their seventh NCAA title against fellow finalists Oklahoma, Michigan, Alabama, Nebraska and Utah.

Alabama will have Olympic rotation and start on vault. Michigan begins on a bye before bars. Nebraska starts on bars, and Utah starts on beam. Oklahoma will begin on floor.

The Bruins had the same exact draw in Friday's semifinal, blasting three big scores on floor (49.325), vault (49.45) and bars (49.35) before faltering on beam in the last rotation with a 48.375. Still, the Bruins' score of 196.5 was enough to qualify for the finals, and the teams will have a clean slate heading into Saturday's competition.

Competition order for Sunday's event finals was also drawn by the NCAA committee on Friday after the semifinal rounds. The Bruins have six routines in event finals. Brittani McCullough will compete on vault and floor, Monique De La Torre and Elyse Hopfner-Hibbs will compete on uneven bars, and Samantha Peszek and Aisha Gerber will compete on balance beam. McCullough drew the fifth spot out of 16 on vault and is ninth out of 12 on floor. Hopfner-Hibbs and De La Torre will compete ninth and 10th, respectively, out of 15 competitors on bars. Peszek is seventh and Gerber ninth in a 10-person beam final. The event finals draw is not finalized, however, and can be shuffled if competitors are in the same flight on different events.

A total of eight Bruins earned 14 All-America honors, the most amongst all teams this season. McCullough is a first-team honoree on vault and floor. Hopfner-Hibbs, who finished in fifth place overall in the all-around, earned first-team honors in the all-around and on bars and second-team acclaim on vault and floor, giving her 10 career All-America honors. De La Torre is a first-team All-American on bars. Peszek received first-team All-America honors on beam and second-team honors on vault. Tauny Frattone becomes a first-time All-American, receiving second-team honors on vault. Olivia Courtney received second-team honors on vault and floor. Gerber is a first-team honoree on beam, and Sydney Sawa picked up second-team All-America acclaim on floor.