Minnesota Gymnastics: Gopher Women Win Big Ten Championships

On Saturday night the Minnesota Golden Gophers women’s gymnastics team hit routine after routine when they needed to and with a team score of 197.750 claimed their first Big Ten Gymnastics Championship since 2006, and the sixth overall in program history. Lexi Ramler did not record a score lower than 9.90 on the day and with a total score of 39.725 claimed the Big Ten All-Around Championship! Ona Loper was in second place in the all-around with a score of 39.575.

The Gophers kicked off the meet on the vault. The Gophers got a trio of 9.90 scores from Mya Hooten, Maddie Quarles and Lexi Ramler.

The Gophers then moved over to the bars. One Loper put up a 9.925, but Ramler would best her scoring a 9.95 to win the individual event championship.

Next would be the beam, which is Minnesota’s best event as a team. it would be no different this time as no Gopher scores less than a 9.800 and Ramler would win yet another individual event championships when she recorded a 9.975 than BTN analyst Olivia Karras said should have been a perfect 10.

The Gophers took the lead after the third rotation and held a .175 lead over Iowa as they teams headed into the final rotation. Minnesota would be on the floor, Iowa on the beam and Michigan who had not lost a Big Ten Team Championship since 2013 would be on the vault.

The Wolverines made a huge run at the end on the vault recording the top four individual scores of the championships including a perfect 10 by Natalie Wojcik. Iowa would falter under the pressure and have two of their gymnasts fall off the beam requiring one to be counted. It would be up to how the Gophers would fare on the floor.

The answer...like champions. Emily Koch opened up with a tie of her career high with a 9.85. Mallory LeNeave added a 9.825 and Minnesota was in business. Ramler wrapped up the all-around title with another 9.90, and then freshman Mya Hooten basically put the title on ice with a 9.90 of her own. Senior Ona Loper was the final Gopher to go and she put a cap on her career at the Pav with a 9.95 and the celebration was on.

At the completion of the meet it was announced that Ramler was named the Big Ten Gymnast of the Year for the third consecutive season!

The Gophers will find out on Monday what NCAA Regional they will be headed to on April 2nd and 3rd. The four regionals this season are located in Salt Lake City, Columbia, Missouri, Durham New Hampshire, and Morgantown, West Virginia. Each regional will have eight teams in it seeded by the NCAA. They eight teams will compete on the 2nd, with the top four teams making it to the Regional Finals on the 3rd. The top two teams from each region will make the NCAA Championships as well as the top four all-around competitors and 16 event specialists on teams that do not qualify. The NCAA Championships will take place two weeks later in Fort Worth, Texas.