Rutgers women’s gymnastics has punched its ticket to the NCAA Championships for the second season in a row after having a good performance at the Big Ten Championships. They used a 195.700 total team score at the Big Ten Championships in Champaign, which was the best of the four teams that competed on Friday night, to seal the last spot in the postseason. Pitt was the original favorite to steal the last spot, but a poor performance at the ACC championships saw the Scarlet Knights move ahead of them
and get the final nod.
This is the first time that Rutgers gymnastics will head to the postseason two years in a row since 2005-2007, when they went three times consecutively.
Last season, Rutgers gymnastics earned a spot in the NCAA regional championships for the first time since 2014 despite scandals surrounding their suspended head coach, Umme Salim-Beasley, who was fired by the university after the season. The Knights have now made it two appearances in a row under new head coach Anastasia Candia, who filled in Salim-Beasley’s role during her suspension before being named the permanent head coach after her departure. Candia, who is an alum of the program, hopes to guide the team further in the tournament this season after they fell in the opening round last season.
The team is led by Gabrielle Dildy and Emily Leese, who earned all Big Ten honors for their outstanding performance this season. Dildy was named to the conference’s first team while Leese was named to the second team. Dildy had a breakout all-around season, competing in all four events for the first time and setting or matching her career high in three of them. Her all-around score of 39.525 at the Rutgers March Quad was the second highest in program history, while she set or matched a career-high on vault, bars, and floor during the season.
Leese had a breakout season after missing all of last year due to an Achilles injury. At the Pink Invitational earlier in the month, she broke her own program record on vault with a 9.950 and matched a career high on floor with a 9.925. Her performance also earned her Big Ten Specialist of the Week honors.
They will hope to lead the team to its furthest run in the national tournament since joining the Big Ten.
