Gymnastics Weekly News: Oklahoma, Michigan and Florida set to defend conference titles

The top three ranked NCAA women's gymnastics teams in North America, the Universities of Oklahoma, Michigan and Florida, will seek to defend their 2022 conference titles Saturday (18 March).

For Oklahoma, a win would be a 12th overall title. The squad under coach K.J. Kindler has won nine of the last 10 titles at the collegiate event.

Bev Plocki's Michigan Wolverines are seeking a 27th Big Ten title this weekend with Jenny Rowland's Gators going for a 12th conference crown.

The No. 4 and No. 5 teams nationally after 10 weeks of competition, UCLA and the University of Utah, will face off for the Pac-12 title. They should expect a challenge from a surging No. 7 California, which broke its school record team total - twice - in week 10 competitions.

Individually, Olympic floor exercise champion Jade Carey continues to lead the way with a national qualifying score (NQS) of 39.820. Olympic team silver medallist Jordan Chiles (39.810) is close behind, having earned the top all-around score of the nation, a 39.900, against Iowa State. Louisiana State University's Haleigh Bryant rounds out the top three with a 39.725 NQS.

Olympic all-around gold medallist Sunisa Lee, who competes collegiately for Auburn University, has been out of competition the last two weekends dealing with "a non-gymnastics health issue," according to a statement from head coach Jeff Graba. Though she's currently ranked ninth, her status for the remainder of the season is unknown.

For a complete schedule of the weekend's competition, click here.

Olympic medallists Vanessa Ferrari, Sanne Wevers targeting Paris 2024 Games

Two veteran gymnasts, Vanessa Ferrari of Italy and Sanne Wevers of the Netherlands, are continuing their careers and each have goals to compete at Paris 2024.

Ferrari, 32, won floor exercise silver at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in 2021. It was her first medal in four appearances at the Games (2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020/21). Now, she has returned to training, according to a report from NBC Olympics.

“She is now back in the gym and will gradually intensify the workloads on her feet,” said a representative for Ferrari. “Clearly there are many unknowns, age, foot problems, but Vanessa wants to try and reach her fifth Olympics.”

For her part, Wevers, the 2016 Olympic champion on the balance beam, is set to make her first competitive appearance since missing the beam final in Tokyo at the Dutch trials for the upcoming European Championships.

"It is not an easy route, but I have a lot of confidence in our team and in the Dutch generation," said Wevers, according to Dutch broadcaster NOS. I really believe that we can achieve great performances."

From the vault...

This week, we take a look back at the People's Republic of China's women's team on the uneven bars during the team optionals at the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain. The squad, which finished fourth overall, was led on the event by Lu Li's 9.937. Lu went on to win the gold medal on the event, scoring a perfect 10.0 in the apparatus final.