By Alicia Bettano The 2017 offseason has been anything but dull in the world of women’s gymnastics. With a record 10 coaching changes (Alaska has recently announced the retirement of the program’s only head coach and Utah State has an opening now that Nadalie Walsh filled the spot at Illinois), some head coach openings—and departures—have left gym fans with more questions than answers. One of the more positive coaching changes for the upcoming 2017-2018 season is the addition of Kim Landrus as head coach of the N.C. State. Landrus, who comes in after 8 years as the head coach of Illinois, will be taking over for Mark Stevenson following the announcement of his retirement. Landrus has served as head coach for the Illini since 2011 and held associate head coach and assistant coach positions at the program in some capacity since 2002. Furthering an already stellar resume, Landrus herself was an accomplished gymnast at Iowa State.
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By Emily Minehart
The annual offseason coaching shuffle has been extreme this year, with nine vacancies or recent changes to date. The Big Ten has been the hardest hit conference, boasting four of those nine changes: Penn State, Michigan State, Ohio State and Illinois are all in the mix. With so many changes, it can be tough to keep track of who’s going where and which teams still have holes to fill. Let us break it down for you.
By Elizabeth Grimsley, Christina Marmet and Caroline Medley
It's almost a given at this point that the majority of teams will hold a pink meet supporting breast cancer. While some teams succeed in their mission of bringing their leotard into this venture, others... Not so much.
The criteria is the same as normal meets except school spirit is replaced by pink meet spirit. And to refresh your memory on the other criteria: up to three points for design; two points for fabric, sparkle, etc.; and two points for spirit; three points for overall appearance. After assigning points to each category, we’ll tally up the scores and average them with the previous week’s. So by the end of the season, we’ll know for sure which team has the best leotards (according to us) and which teams not so much. We want to know what you thought too (or if we forgot one of your favorites from this weekend)! Let us know in the comments below or on Twitter. And make sure to vote in our poll at the bottom of the page to make your opinion heard in the fan vote, new this season. By Caroline Medley It’s a Pac-12 rematch in Champaign next weekend as top seeds UCLA and Oregon State will fight to keep the status quo and qualify to nationals as the presumptive winners. However, the path to qualification will not be easy, as the Bruins and the Beavs have some tough competition. Only 21 places separate the top-ranked team from the bottom one. Iowa and Illinois will be clawing their way to the top, and things will get especially interesting there since the Illini are at home. Ohio State, too, will join its conference-mates in an attempt to qualify while Eastern Michigan has been steadily on the rise throughout the season. UCLA and Oregon State have both seen upsets this season, and all of the remaining teams have had excellent seasons—should make for an exciting night!
Don’t forget to enter your postseason predictions in the 2017 NCAA Gym Bracket Challenge! The deadline for submissions is Friday, March 31 at 7 p.m. ET.
By Elizabeth Grimsley
With the 2017 Nastia Liukin Cup two days away, it’s time to take a closer look at the qualifiers and where they stand going into Friday’s competition. After seven weeks, we finally have all 36 qualifiers—18 juniors and 18 seniors—that will represent their club gyms, as well as, for some, their future colleges in New Jersey.
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Days until the 2017 National ChampionshipsArchives
July 2017
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