Strong Worth, Texas – The Oklahoma Sooners had 366 days for stew at their early exit from the NCAA 2024 gymnastics championships and the denial of their quest for a three peat.
After being flooded with an apparently endless rebroadcast of what was wrong and, according to head coach Kj Kindler, frequent criticism and hatred, Oklahoma has officially recovered at the top of the world of university gymnastics by winning the NCAA female title on Saturday with a final score of 198.0125, 0.4 better than UCLA.
He marked the third title of the NCAA of Sooners team in four years and their seventh since 2014.
While the disappointment of the 2024 season made the victory even softer, Kindler insisted that the team did not think of the redemption entering the final of Saturday in Dickies Arena – even if everyone was.
“Our theme was not at all the redemption this year,” said Kindler to journalists a few moments after the team hoisted the trophy. “We did our best to put it behind us. It followed us everywhere and therefore it was almost impossible. Whenever you look in the rear view mirror, it was right there.
“And it makes it soft? Yes, but this team was capable of this last year. We just failed. And people fail all the time. They fail every day. And we are talking about (that) all the time that glory is recovering.”
Oklahoma opened the competition on Balance Beam and set the tone for an impressive afternoon. The first year Lily Pederson, who fell on the semi-final event on Thursday, had one of the best performances in his university career with a 9.9375 in third position. With six gymnasts in competition on each event and the five best scores that count to the total, the Sooners did not have to include a score of less than 9.90. Their 49,6125 put them on a par with the UCLA, which opened its doors, for the first lead.
After that, the Sooners took control, taking an advance of 0.300 on the Bruins halfway and never looked back.
“We did exactly what we do at the gymnasium every day,” said Audrey Davis, a fifth year senior. “We did not change it, we did not try to be different. We went there and we did our gymnastics. We left everything on the ground, we really did. We finished in empty. And it was a great thing for our team, to really go there and do our normal, so as not to have started to do.
As the Oklahoma had finished its third rotation on Vault and extended its advance, the team appeared jovial and was seen dancing while waiting to turn to its last event.
The final rotation on the uneven bars was more like a victory tour. The Sooners waited to encourage and officially react what they had accomplished after the final scores were displayed on Jumbotron, but their excitement was palpable and it was clear that they knew well before it was official. Despite strong UCLA performance on the beam during the fourth rotation, including a score pair of 9.9375 by Jornior Jordan Chiles and the senior Emma Malabuyo, the deficit was too much for the Bruins to overcome.
Although it was not the result he wanted, UCLA has finally had its best result since 2019 with its second place. Chiles had the best versatile competition in the competition with a 39,7750 during the day.
Utah first seemed to end in third place before a last -minute score investigation increases the final total of the Missouri. In the end, the Tigers finished in third place – the best result of the program in its first final appearance – and Utah ended in fourth place. Many red rocks, including the Senior Star Grace McCallum, seemed to cry when presenting the trophy.
Utah’s reaction was a striking contrast with that of Oklahoma, a few meters away. The Sooners led a song “Boomer Sooner” while waiting to accept their trophy, then danced to “All I Do Is Win” by Dj Khaled while Confetti was raining.
But it was the result of 2024 that helped to propel the team to victory.
Oklahoma used it as motivation throughout the pre-season and throughout the regular season. Despite being classified n ° 1 for much of the regular season, Kindler and the Sooners called themselves “outsider” And believed they had something to prove. After falling into the semi-finals last season after having recorded three unusual landing errors on Vault, the first event of the competition team, Oklahoma admitted that there was a relief on Thursday after the advance, and Kindler said that she was grateful “The dragon had been killed.” She added that she never wanted to “see Oklahoma television images falling again and again in the safe.”
With this weight raised, and perhaps with the shocking elimination in the LSU semi-finals-the reigning national champions and perhaps the rival and the fiercest threat of Oklahoma for the title-The Sooners were able to simply focus on their performances on Saturday afternoon. It was something Kindler said they had to understand Thursday after their semi-finals.
“After getting forward and we arrived today, we were free,” said Davis. “We had no weight on our shoulders. We were free to make our best gymnastics. ”
Thursday, “We were all very present.
Thus, even if Kindler and the Sooners were perhaps not concentrated on redemption, they reached it – then some – with their amazing turnaround a year ago.
With its seven team championships, Oklahoma enters into equality with the UCLA for the third of all time, following only Georgia (10) and UTAH (9). While the Sooners lose Davis, Bowers and Danielle Sievers, the team should stay among the first to win the title in 2026. They return several stars subclasses, including Junior Faith Torrez and Pederson. And Danae Fletcher, a senior who has not been able to compete since the first meeting of the 2024 season due to two LCA tears, announced on Saturday that she would return for a fifth year.