New Gymnastics hires

I'll trust Jay and Woodward on this one.

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The Griffeths come to Baton Rouge after serving as assistant coaches for two seasons at the University of Utah. In that time, the Utes went 21-1 during the regular season, won the 2021 Pac-12 Championship and finished third nationally after advancing to the NCAA Championship Final.

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Utah Gymnast Mailie O'Keefe won the NCAA floor championship and was named the Pac-12 Gymnast of the Year under McCool Griffeth. O'Keefe and Sydney Soloski were also named All-Americans on floor in 2021. Under Griffeth, the Utah vault lineup finished in the top-10 of the national rankings both years with a pair of All-Americans. For their work, Garrett and Courtney were named the WGCA Region 2 Assistant Coaches of the Year in 2020.

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In their first season at Arkansas, the duo helped the Razorbacks advance to the NCAA Championships for the first time in five seasons in 2018. Griffeth, who coached a vault All-American in Braie Speed. McCool Griffeth coached and choreographed Sophia Carter to regular season All-America honors on floor and Carter qualified as an individual competitor into the 2019 NCAA Championships. The Razorbacks set several school records from 2018-19 and achieved a program first with consecutive fifth-place SEC finishes.

They previously coached four seasons at TWU, where Griffeth was the 2014 Coaches Association Division II Assistant Coach of the Year and the 2017 Midwest Independent Conference Assistant Coach of the Year. He coached 16 USAG All-Americans on vault and bars, a USAG national bar champion and two USAG bar runners-up. McCool Griffeth coached two USAG national floor champions. In their last season at TWU, the Pioneers won the 2017 USAG National Championship.

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They sound like good hires to me!

LSU just poached two highly respected coaches from a top 5 program

This gymnastics team is going to be something special next year.

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This gymnastics team is going to be something special next year.

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They are gonna be really good. Got to clean beam and bars a little but the team has extremely high potential this year.

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This guy gets credit for everything I’d say the chances of him being involved in this (other than signing off on it) are less than none.

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I'm taking this as complete sarcasm. Anyone who have an ounce of logic knows that ADs are highly involved in every single hire within their department, especially these days in the era of immediate 24/7 news+social media coverage. Interviews for assistant coaches are not just some "oh, you like this person, Head Coach? Cool. He's my Herbie Hancock on their contract. Have fun."

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Tigerbait357, would it be fair to say that the coaching staff has a specialist for all 4 events now? Jay on bars, Bug on beam, McCool-Griffeth on floor, and Griffeth on vault?

Would you consider them upgrades or pretty similar over Ashleigh and Bob respectively for those 2 events? I know Bob Moore had a good reputation.

Do you see this having much of an impact on recruiting or is that part of things pretty much "is what it is"?

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Garrett will coach vault, Jay on bars, Gnat on beam and Courtney on floor. That said a lot of them collaborate on multiple events so its not only one person. Both new coaches are very young but experienced so they bring new ideas to the table. Fresh perspective can be a good thing.

I think it would be impossible to call anyone an upgrade over Bob Moore from a coaching perspective. The man was best of the best and his track record proves it. That isn't to say Garrett isn't a good coach. He has had success as a coach at ever stop he has been at (AK, TWU, and Utah).

I do think we may see more of an upswing on recruiting. Garrett and Courtney are highly respected and well liked people with extensive recruiting ties, from elite circuit to many top gyms that produce great JO athletes. I think this is one area I think we will see a boost in. Not that we didn't recruit well already.