Bama Gymnastics Starts SEC Title Defense on Uneven Bars
3/19/2004 12:00:00 AM | Gymnastics
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The Alabama Gymnastics team will start the defense of its Southeastern Conference Championship on the uneven bars Saturday night beginning at 7 p.m. ET at The Arena in the Gwinett Center in Duluth, Ga.
The Crimson Tide’s rotation order was decided today by a random draw. Starting on the uneven bars, the Tide will move to the balance beam before taking a bye for rotation three. The floor exercise will follow, then another bye before finishing competition on the vault. The Tide will sit on a bye for the seventh and final rotation to see where they will finish the meet.
This is the same rotation Alabama started the season with at the Super Six Challenge, a meet that also featured Georgia and Florida, and one the Tide won.
“This is a good rotation for us,” head coach Sarah Patterson said. “Although to be honest, you have to compete on all four events at some point during the night, so really there isn’t one that’s much better than another. It doesn’t hurt that we’ve already gone through this rotation at the Super Six Challenge. We are just ready to go out there and try and defend out title.”
The battle for the SEC Championship is expected to be heated. Alabama is the league’s top ranked team, coming in at No. 3 in the latest national rankings followed by Georgia, last year’s SEC runner-up, at No. 4. LSU stands at No. 5 and Florida at No. 8. All four teams have been hot over the last half of the season and all are expected to make a title run. Six of the conference’s seven gymnastics teams are ranked in the top 25.
“There have been years when peopled have called this a two team race,” Patterson said. “This year that certainly isn’t the case.”
The Tide’s run will be keyed by senior all-around All-American Jeana Rice, sophomore NCAA vault champion Ashley Miles, junior All-American Alexis Brion and junior all-around All-American Shannon Hrozek.
2004 Southeastern Conference Gymnastics Championship Draw
Bye 1 Vault Bye 2 Uneven Bars
Rotation 1 Georgia Auburn Kentucky Alabama
Rotation 2 LSU Georgia Auburn Kentucky
Rotation 3 Florida LSU Georgia Auburn
Rotation 4 Arkansas Florida LSU Georgia
Rotation 5 Alabama Arkansas Florida LSU
Rotation 6 Kentucky Alabama Arkansas Florida
Rotation 7 Auburn Kentucky Alabama Arkansas
Balance Beam Bye 3 Floor Exercise
Rotation 1 Arkansas Florida LSU
Rotation 2 Alabama Arkansas Florida
Rotation 3 Kentucky Alabama Arkansas
Rotation 4 Auburn Kentucky Alabama
Rotation 5 Georgia Auburn Kentucky
Rotation 6 LSU Georgia Auburn
Rotation 7 Florida LSU Georgia
