No. 4 Gymnastics Hosts No. 1 Georgia Friday
1/31/2008 12:00:00 AM | Gymnastics
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. ?? The most storied rivalry in collegiate gymnastics is renewed Friday at 7:30 p.m. when No. 4 Alabama welcomes No. 1 ranked Georgia to Coleman Coliseum.
“This rivalry has helped college gymnastics grow,” Alabama head coach Sarah Patterson said. “The excitement and enthusiasm this meet generates, the crowds, it’s something that programs all across the country want. I think this rivalry has been very good for college gymnastics.”
The meet will be broadcast on a tape-delayed basis by Fox Sports Network. Alabama is 3-0 overall, 2-0 in Southeastern Conference competition coming into Friday’s meet while Georgia is 3-1, 2-0 in the SEC. The Bulldogs’ lone loss came in the season’s first meet at No. 2 ranked Utah. Since then the Bulldogs are undefeated, including a win over then No. 1 Florida in Gainesville by a slim .025 margin.
Individually, Georgia is led by junior Courtney Kupets, ranked fourth nationally in the all-around. The Crimson Tide is led by sophomore Morgan Dennis who is at No. 5 in the all-around. Kupets is the two-time defending NCAA All-Around Champion, while Dennis won the 2007 NCAA Floor Exercise title as a rookie. Dennis is one of three Tide gymnast ranked in the top-20 nationally. Freshman Kayla Hoffman is 12th and sophomore Kassi Price is 14th.
Tickets are available through the Alabama Ticket Office (205.348.2262) located in the lobby of Coleman Coliseum and online at RollTide.com. The fun begins before the meet even starts, including the always popular Lamb Family entertaining before march-in and giveaways such as a Playstation 3, three Nintendo Wiis, Bose Headphones, a Sony PSP, a Portable DVD Player, a Nintendo DS Lite, two Sirius Satellite Radios, five Toys-R-Us gift certificates, an iPod Nano and a Boom Chair.
Alabama and Georgia are two of the legendary programs in the annals of collegiate gymnastics, winning four and eight national team titles respectively. Georgia comes to town as the three-time defending NCAA Champions and will be going for their fourth in a row at home in April. The Tide made its 25th consecutive NCAA Championship appearance last season, a streak bettered only by Utah.
Both teams are perennial national contenders with Alabama finishing among the nation’s “final four” 21 times and the Bulldogs 20 times. And until Florida broke the streak last season, either Alabama or Georgia won every SEC team title since 1990.
The two teams tend to bring out the best in each other. Last year the Bulldogs posted their season best score in the dual meet against the Tide last season in Athens in front of a sellout crowd of 10,224. The last time the two teams faced off in Tuscaloosa it was a down-to-the-wire nail biter with Georgia eking out a .05 victory in front of 14,263 fans, the sixth largest crowd in the nation over the past dozen years.
And the 2006 crowd is the norm when the Bulldogs come to town. Six times the Alabama-Georgia meet in Tuscaloosa has led the nation in attendance. The first time Alabama sold out Coleman Coliseum was in 1997 when 15,043 came to see the Tide and Bulldogs compete.
Players Mentioned
