re: LSU Gymnastics Recruiting Thread (2024 and 2025 Recruiting Classes)

Congrats to Haleigh and Amari for their SEC Honors this week. The team left for Utah today. Keeping high hopes for a good meet for the team this weekend.

No, I’ve been keeping my eyes glued looking too!

They posted a team picture and it doesn’t look like she is there

Right?! Like her vault at 101 was so good!

With the way that scores were flying for the teams tonight - we really should hope to capitalize with a good road score tomorrow. I know it’s early, it the judging is even crazier than it was last year.

I saw where we start on beam then go to the Olympic rotation after that event. The format is new for this year. Praying for a steady beam tonight although starting on beam can bring on the nerves for gymnasts and fans. At least beam will be behind them after the first rotation.

Closer look at Konnor’s bar routine. Love Jay’s and the team’s reactions

Konnor’s Bars

Some of my takes - that no one asked for lol - on yesterday's meet:

- Kiya should not be doing AA every week, but unfortunately it seems that that's the route they're going for. Her yurchenko double is not competition ready, so I'd take her out of the vault line up for now, until (and if) she consistently gets the landing. That's allegedly the event we have most depth, so we could come up with something there (also, Chase Brock). Kiya's bars was great - like great great. I think beam was just a fluke, given what went on before her - she's still an essential piece there.
- Beard was great on beam other than the fall. No built-in deductions on that routine. Once she gets consistent in that 2nd spot, they should even try her on lead-off IMO. Her dismount is much more stickable than Jeffrey's and having a standing front tuck in your beam lead-off is a CHOICE.
- Sierra will not go over 9.850 on beam at nationals even with a hit. It's just what it is, given the routine construction. But I'm okey with her competing for now as long as it is not a fall fest.
- The Sierra to Olivia on floor does not make sense to me. Olivia's routine is not going to build off of Sierra's when the latter gets properly awarded. It's not impressive enough and it's not clean enough, so I'd say experiment other options on that second spot. Cowan has a potentially great floor lead-off type of routine that sould also be considered, followed maybe by Sierra;
- Bars was great of course. I do not love to see Sav followed by Bryant though, their routines are almost identical - but that's just me. I think Sav - Konnor - Bryant would make more sense, if Konnor keeps getting consistent. Tori and Cowan should be competing for the second spot and I really like how trustful those routines are. Jeff's lead-off is money - and they can't deduct for the squat on the landing anymore, unless her hips go below the knee joints.
- Finnegan keeps impressing me each and every meet. I'm always anxious about her triple series, but the girl has ice water in her veins. Regarding bars, If they don't change her dismount, I'm cool with her being a 3-eventer. Her floor and beam are obviously irreplaceable. On vault, I feel like the Omelianchik is just going to score big when she sticks it. They seem to either go very low for that one (dismount + plus shape in the air) or lights out (ignoring shape in the air deductions because of the stick). Maybe time to try the 1.5?
That's it. What y'all think?

I wish that Alexis would replace the standing front tuck on BEAM with another forward skill. She is getting hammered on the pause before execution, a deep landing and sometimes a wobble. Her score would go up with the change. She has very nice lines.

Looking back at the bars rotation, I wouldn’t be opposed to having a lineup order of Alexis, Tori, Sav, Konnor, Kiya, then Haleigh. If just to give some space between Sav’s and Haleigh’s almost identical routines.

Also beam, I would give Annie another shot. She was out all last year. She deserves a little more time to get her footing.