AUBURN, Ala. – The Auburn gymnastics team enters the week at No. 5 per RoadToNationals.com. The weekly rankings are based on the overall team score from the season-opening weekend.
Auburn kicked off the year with a 197.350 at the inaugural Super 16 in Las Vegas this past Saturday. The score was a program-best season opening mark as the Tigers finished third behind No. 1 Oklahoma (197.925), No. 4 Michigan (197.400), then-No. 10 UCLA (197.275).
"It's just a really exciting time right now for this Auburn team," head coach Jeff Graba said. "What a great way to start the season at a fantastic event. It was great to get a really good score to get us started on the right track. Being this highly ranked is just verification of how good we can be."
This week's top has Oklahoma at No. 1 and Florida at No. 2 (197.750). California is third (197.475) with Michigan coming in fourth.
The rest of the Southeastern Conference is among the top 20 – Alabama (No. 8), LSU (t-No. 10), Kentucky (No. 12), Missouri (No. 14), Arkansas (t-No. 16) and Georgia (t-No. 20).
Auburn ranks first nationally on vault with a 49.500. The team's score in the event this past Saturday tied a program record and four Tigers finished with a 9.9 or better.
"I was really happy with our vault performance," Graba said. "We've heard a lot about how we've had to improve on that event and I think our vault squad really took that to heart. That score was just a reward for all their hard work."
The Tigers are sixth on bars (49.400), tied for seventh on floor (49.300) and tied for ninth on beam (49.150).
Individually, sophomore Sunisa Lee leads the nation in the all-around with a 39.750. She's tied for first on beam with a perfect 10.0 after winning both the all-around and beam at the Super 16. She's tied for fourth on bars at 9.95.
Fifth year Derrian Gobourne is tied for second nationally on vault after tying a career high with a 9.95. Senior Cassie Stevens is tied for fourth on vault with a 9.925.
