AUBURN, Ala. – The 2022 Auburn gymnastics team made history all season, breaking attendance barriers, earning a record number of accolades and setting new program bests.
With a newly upgraded attendance number, the 2022 squad enjoyed competing in front of 9,121 at all five regular season home meets. A total of 45,605 fans came to see the Tigers in Neville Arena, while a handful of the meets were sold out prior to the start of the season.
"Neville Arena was the best gymnastics environment in the country," head coach Jeff Graba said. "Competing in front of that home crowd not only was a tremendous advantage for our team, but it was also a tremendous reward for our gymnasts every Friday night. Simply put, we owe a bunch of our success in 2022 to the home environment and are so thankful to the Auburn fans for showing up every night."
Auburn also broke its season ticket record, having 5,674 on the year.
In addition to the great home attendance, Auburn saw record numbers at all road meets. Every meet away from the Plains during the regular season was either a program record or season high attendance for the host institution – at North Carolina (4,125), at Arkansas (10,345), at LSU (13,569), at Georgia (10,224), at Michigan (12,707).
"I think the really interesting thing regarding our team is the environment that surrounded us from the very beginning," Graba said. "The pressure was mounting as early as August for the team and on Suni in particular. However, as we started the season at North Carolina it was evident that this was a whole different animal."
In total, the Tigers competed in front of 131,631 fans between regular season and postseason meets. That included 10,180 fans at the 2022 SEC Championship in Birmingham.
"I thought our team handled the craziness and stress of all the scrutiny and attention that surrounded us last year really well," Graba said. "No other team was dealing with the chaos and media frenzy that our team was dealing with. Our youth and inexperience were a big story, but I think the real secret to our success last year was how our team handled the sellouts on the road, the crowds around the team bus, the random strangers walking out on the floor of competition and talking to our athletes. These were all dealt with on a daily basis and I'm very proud of how this team handled themselves."
