NCAA Women's Gymnastics Preview with Olivia Karas

Olivia Karas of BTN gives her analysis of the NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Regionals. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hi, everybody, and welcome in College Sports Team Today. Peter Stoney here, and it's time to talk some women's gymnastics. The NCAA tournament is off and running regionals this week. Eleven Big Ten teams tying a conference record now. Uh having an opportunity to bring home a title. And uh let's bring in from BTN to help us break it all down. Olivia Karras back with us here to talk some women's gymnastics. Olivia, how are you?

SPEAKER_01 0:30

I'm good. How are you?

SPEAKER_00 0:31

I'm doing well. It's good to see you. I'm sure you're really excited. This is a great time of the year, right, in the gymnastics world. Uh let's start with what I just said. 11 teams again, as we had last year, right? Tying a record. Big picture. What was the conference like this year for you, Olivia?

SPEAKER_01 0:47

You know, I was really impressed. I think everyone assumes that it's going to be the UCLA show with Jordan Childs and Sienna Alipio and Tiana Sumana Sacra. And that's incredible, but I was so impressed by some of these other teams that had rising stars. Like Minnesota is a perfect example. You lose Maya Hooten. She's now a coach, and then out comes Ariana Ostrom, who is just a star to be born. Same thing with Iowa, with Sophie Shrever, just so impressive. Um, youngsters for the Spartans, the Wolverines, uh, for Maryland, for Ohio State. And so I think it was a year where everyone expected the top people to do really well. And the teams that are in those mid-range places that have a lot of potential and places to grow grew. And I thought that that showcased very nicely at the Big Ten Championship. And there's a lot of really good momentum going into the national championship.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

Well, there are four Big Ten teams who have national seeds. Uh UCLA is one of them, as you mentioned. Your alma mater, Michigan, is in there, Michigan State of Minnesota. Uh, but before we get to all that, I want to sort of pull back a little bit because you know, we've been talking a lot, obviously, about basketball with the women's final four this weekend, the men's final four, and some of the other sports that are going on right now softball, baseball. But when you're an athlete, as you were, take us inside the locker room, take us inside your mindset and preparation, Olivia, when they get to this time of the year in the tournament.

SPEAKER_01 2:11

At this point, you are so tired and you're likely getting ready for finals on top of everything. So there's just a lot on your plate, much more than usual. And what our team used to always go into postseason with is you can't possibly prepare more than you already have. You've done all of preseason, you've competed in 10, maybe 11 meets already. And now you're at the point where it's just honing in on the details and being really intentional about nutrition, rest, uh, making sure that you know you don't do something stupid like roll your ankle, walking to class. There's a lot of this really small things that you're paying a lot of attention to and just being really present. I remember when we were training my senior year, uh going into the national championship when we'd qualified as one of the eight teams, and everything had had purpose. If you were doing something, it was because, you know, when you uh did a routine and your coach said you missed a handstand, it was all handstand work. Or if you found yourself struggling a little bit with one specific pass, you honed in on that and you really just didn't want to do anything extra because your body just couldn't handle it at that point. So I know that a lot of the teams are gonna go into this weekend. You have to be loose. If you focus way too much on we have to qualify, that's usually when things go awry. And so staying present, staying in the moment, controlling what you can control, those are really the keys to this weekend.

SPEAKER_00 3:34

You just answered the next question I was gonna ask you because we talked about this exact same thing last week on the show about the frozen four and the hockey team. How do you make sure you stay within yourself and you don't go beyond what got you as far as you are right now with the tournament, Olivia?

SPEAKER_01 3:46

That's a great question. And I think gymnastics is twofold with it. Because we don't necessarily have offense and defense, it's technically easier because you're not directly interacting with the other team during a competition. However, on the flip side, that's where you can really get in your head and find yourself if you're going downhill, you can go downhill. So I've always said, and when I was in college, we looked at it this way that each event is a quarter. It's like if you're playing football, your first event is your first quarter and you can have a great quarter, and then your second quarter can go really downhill, or you can be great in the first half and the second half, it's not so great. And so if you look at each event and each routine almost as a segment, you can re fix your mindset if at some point it's not going that great. And so I think for us, that was the most important thing. You always talk about being in your bubble, but when you're, you know, one of the regionals is at in Baton Rouge, LSU is notorious for 10,000 plus crowds. It's really hard to stay in your bubble. And so you have to practice it and be mindful about it, or it that's when it can get really tricky. Um, so a lot of intentionality with being with your team, finding someone who could be your person, and then also just being mindful of the fact that you can only control how much you can control.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

So there are four sites this weekend. As you mentioned, Baton Rouge is one of them. Let's talk about the two Big Ten teams that are there, Michigan and Nebraska. What do you expect out of those two squads with uh obviously a pretty deep field down there in Louisiana, to your point?

SPEAKER_01 5:16

Yeah, that's right. Well, Nebraska's in round one. So they're in the play-in round, which means that two teams will compete against each other and the team that wins will then move on to the next quad meet the following day. And so what Nebraska needs to do is just do their normal. I think at the Big Ten championship, they got a little tight and nervous and they made some mistakes that I've not seen them make in the past. And a lot of that, again, can just come from if one person is feeling stressed and it carries on to the rest of the team, that's where you just need to regroup and figure out how to get back on track. And I think this Nebraska team can do that. They just need to stay in focus and in their bubble. So I think for them, what's really important is not changing anything and going into that first, first meet and just hitting, don't necessarily need to stick everything, but they need to just be aware. For Michigan, Michigan, you know, they won the national championship in 2021. And since then, they haven't been back to the final four, uh, to four on the floor. And that's a really tricky thing when you have such incredible talent. And so for Michigan, what they need to do is again stay focused on the moment, but also not get ahead of themselves. I think this Michigan team has, you know, Reina Gajino and Carly Bauman, they're sixth-year seniors. They won a national championship in 2021. And now they're looking to get back there. And for them, it's staying, keeping the team on track of we can't be thinking about what we're gonna do in the regional final. We have to get there first. And in order to do that, we need to just focus on you don't have to be perfect, but you need to be solid and consistent across the board.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

So that's uh Baton Rouge. Let's go to Lexington. We've got Maryland, Ohio State, and Rutgers there. Three interesting squads for me. Give us a little thumbnail on those three Big Ten schools, Olivia.

SPEAKER_01 7:00

You know, Rutgers last year qualified to this exact competition for the first time since like 2014. So they have certainly been on an uptick, and it's really impressive. And I think what I'm most impressed with their team is that their upperclassmen are not just remaining the way they've been their whole career, they're adding events and they're PRing and getting career bests. And so you're seeing that rise at the right time. And we saw that at the Big Ten Championship. Emily Lees coming back from an Achilles injury and uh shares a um shares second place on floor at the Big Ten Championship. So impressive. Gabby Dildy, the same thing. And so I think for Rutgers, they compete with such a natural, authentic energy. And I truly believe that that is going to help them. For them, the biggest thing is minimizing deductions on landings. They have the big gymnastics, they've just struggled with almost maintaining your adrenaline to stay in the moment and in your space. And I think Ohio State and Maryland have also experienced that same thing. Maryland is not put a full meet together. At Big Tens, I talked to their head coach Brett Nelligan, and he was like, we hit 23 out of 24 routines, but the scores didn't really reflect that. And he was talking about how there's a lot of small details that they can work on. So I think that's very important for them. And Ohio State is led by some heavy hitters. JJ Coleman has a 10 on floor this year. She can absolutely qualify to the national championship if Ohio State doesn't as a team. Tori Vetter is a solid all-arounder. And so again, I it I sound like a broken record, but I think the most important thing at this point is you it's not just about hitting routines, it's about hitting them with intentionality and it not necessarily expecting perfection, but expecting to get a quarter tenth, half tenth better each time in order to rise at the right time.

SPEAKER_00 8:48

All right. Out of the Pacific Northwest, interesting quartet of schools out there and teams uh in Corvallis. We've got Iowa, Minnesota, UCLA, and Washington. So a couple of Pacific uh Coast out teams, uh, Northwest Coast out teams out there as well. Give us a little look at that quartet of squads out there in the Pacific Northwest.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

You know, everyone's expecting UCLA to be a shoe-in. And while I do believe that they have an excellent chance of qualifying, there's still work to be done, and anything can happen at regionals and this round of the national championship. And so for them, you know, Jordan Chiles has been unstoppable this year. It's actually incredible and out of control for me to understand how she could get better as time goes on. And I was talking about this with someone recently. She scored four times a 39.8 plus. That's averaging a 9.95 on every event, which is just insane. And so the capability there is remarkable. But what UCLA has been playing with is depth. They have athletes competing in the all-around pretty frequently. And what they need to maintain is how people are feeling. Two days, um, you know, almost back to back. There's a day in between of doing floor and vault is a lot on your body. So it's figuring out the right strategy for those events. Minnesota peaking at the right time. You know, they counted a fall on beam at the Big Ten Championship, super uncharacteristic. They would have been right there with Michigan State. And so I think they have a lot to give. They have a harder time competing away, that I've noticed. So, what I'm going to be very curious about is how their training has gone into getting them to a point to be comfortable in that place. Iowa's Our Lee Tran is one of the best bar workers in the country. I think if she hits bars and their team doesn't qualify to nationals, she should be a shoe-in to go to the national championship. And Washington is a team that is gaining talent back from injury. Dia Moody is one of them, Lana Navarro. They've just seen people come back in their lineups that they didn't have last year. And here they are in the tournament as a team where they weren't last year. And so I think that's just incredibly impressive. It's really showing the growth of the team. And for them, I know they're really excited to be in and they're on their side of the country. So I'm hoping they get some fans out there to support and just enjoy and do their best gymnastics that they've been doing.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

And the last regional is out in Tempe, two Big Ten teams there, Michigan State and Penn State. So some of their fans are gonna have to go out there and maybe get a little warmer weather to support those squads. What about those two out there out there in Arizona?

SPEAKER_01 11:19

You know, Penn State to me is a really interesting school because they don't get a lot of attention, but I think they're very much an unsung hero and they're smooth sailing. You know, they don't, they're not really hot, they're not really low, they're really in the middle. And that can be a superpower when these high and low teams are having a low day. And I think that's what Penn State does really well. They're very consistent, they're good technique, not the huge big skills, but very detail-oriented. Their beam is difficult. Floor is not as difficult as some of the other, you know, Michigan State or UCLA teams. But what they do really well is they're mindful of the small things. So I think if other teams are having a rough day, you should watch out for Penn State and in general watch out for them because when they're against these teams that are not necessarily in the conference that are in different conferences that have the same strategy as them, that could get really interesting. And Michigan State can't coming off of last year of qualifying for the first time in program history. I think actually second time, but it's it's been a hot sack, is so impressive. They lost some big names last year. But I have been impressed with how athletes have come back from injuries, like Stephanie Lebster's now in floor. Isabella Trostel did not compete for two years and now she's in beam. They have the Olympian and Lilia Cosman from Romania. There's just a lot of pieces for them that if they can put the puzzle together, is quite dangerous.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

All right. So as we are very Big Ten centric here, they gave it you did a good job on the 11 teams here. 50,000 foot view. You mentioned LSU. Who are some of the other squads that you're looking for to get down there to the finals when we decide this thing in Texas in a couple of weeks?

SPEAKER_01 12:56

You know, I you always want to say, oh, I think it's going to be this team. And then next thing you know, you they're head, they have an off day and it can all break loose. I think um the University of Oklahoma is notoriously a remarkable program that is the expectation is to be at four on the floor. And so I would not be surprised if they weren't. Now, University of Florida just beat them in the SEC championship. They beat them and LSU. So anything can happen really, and it all just depends on how detail-oriented you can be. I think UCLA, I know we just talked about them. I think they have a really good team, and I'm very impressed by them. I'm really impressed by Clemson with the new uh head coaches, uh Justin and Liz Crandall Howell, there, who came from uh University of California, Berkeley. One year they win the ACC championship. That's pretty impressive to me. They are right on par with the other teams that are winning conferences and in these uh highly ranked situations. So I find it to be a year where there isn't really one clear heavy hitter. I think everyone has vulnerabilities, and that ultimately is going to make it truly madness. And I'm excited about it.

SPEAKER_00 14:08

Well, I know you are. Before you go, the last question I'll ask you is there some squad that maybe surprised you that you didn't expect to be as good as they have been this year, or maybe someone that fell a little flat that you thought would be better going into the season, Olivia?

SPEAKER_01 14:21

Yeah, that's a that's a great question. I did want to mention that um while the University of Illinois is not sending a team, they are sending some individuals at the Lexington Regional. And one of those individuals is Chloe Cho. And for a while, Chloe Cho was the number one ranked all-arounder in the Big Ten. She and Jordan were kind of going, you know, Jordan had a big rise here and there, but you know, she can hold her own. And I think she gets overlooked sometimes. And what I'm I continue to be impressed by is from her freshman year till now, I think if Chloe Cho hits all around like she normally does, she has a very high chance of qualifying to the national championship and could really have a high chance of of of meddling um in the all-around. So I'm continuously impressed by her. I think Minnesota surprised me. Minnesota losing Maya Hooten was really tough. For five years, she was a three-event superstar. You could count on her for a nine-nine or higher on three events every single time. And with that, with the hometown hero energy and with the whole the way she competes and the vibe she brings, that is really hard to replace. And I think the way they've done it has been quite impressive. So they definitely were a team that I was wildly impressed by. And in terms of, you know, teams that are rebuilding, I think Marilyn lost Alexa Rothenbusher, which was a big, big competitor for them. And they have a lot of youngsters. Their head coach was telling me their bar lineup, one athlete is an athlete from last year. Everyone else is new. And so when you talk about building, yes, they might be new this year, but think about the advantage they have next year for having these athletes now having experience. So I'd be curious to see how they compete with youngsters who have never been in a national championship bracket experience. But this is only gonna help them moving forward because these youngsters will be there for another three years.

SPEAKER_00 16:14

No, it's been a great season. It's gonna be a great tournament. We can't wait. You do a great job breaking it down. We appreciate it. Enjoy it, and we'll find out who's gonna be a champion here before too long. Well, Olivia, thank you.

SPEAKER_01 16:24

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 16:25

It's Olivia Karas from BTN as we get ready for the NCAA women's gymnastics regionals this week. I'm Pete Pistoni. This is College Sports Team Today. Thanks for tuning in. We'll see you next time.