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Oklahoma Gymnastics: It’s National Deja Vu All Over Again for Sooners

By Chip Rouse

Apr 15, 2017; St. Louis, MO, USA; Oklahoma Sooners gymnastics team celebrates as they drop the trophy after winning the National Championships during the 2017 NCAA Women's Gymnastics Championships at Chaifetz Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports
Apr 15, 2017; St. Louis, MO, USA; Oklahoma Sooners gymnastics team celebrates as they drop the trophy after winning the National Championships during the 2017 NCAA Women's Gymnastics Championships at Chaifetz Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Curry-USA TODAY Sports /
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A year ago, Oklahoma gymnastics became the only men’s and women’s squads from the same school to win a national championship double-double in the same season.

The Sooners are halfway there again in 2017 after the OU women completed an undefeated season and  captured a second straight NCAA championship and third overall on Saturday in St. Louis.

Led by freshman sensation Maggie Nichols, Oklahoma posted a team score of 198.3875, a new record in the NCAA Super Six finals. That broke the previous high-water mark (198.1750) in the Super Six team competition, set in 2014 by both Oklahoma and Florida.

Nichols posted the high score among the Sooners in all four events, including a perfect 10.0 on the balance beam. The OU freshman from Little Canada, Minn., has posted a perfect score on the beam three times this season. Her 10.0 in Saturday’s Super Six finals was only the fourth time in NCAA history a perfect score has been recorded on the beam in the NCAA championship finals.

“Our coaching staff really worked hard to come up with a way to flip the switch, coming off kind of an average performance (in Friday’s semifinals),” –OU women’s coach K.J. Kindler

Oklahoma advanced to the Super Six competition with a team win in one of the two semifinal rounds on Friday, the fifth straight year the Sooners have been in championship finals. Although they posted the highest team score in Semifinal I, it was not one of their best performances this season.

“Our coaching staff really worked hard to come up with a way to flip the switch on our team, coming off kind of an average performance for us yesterday (Friday),” said K.J. Kindler, Sooner women’s coach.

“We met four times last night and this morning just trying to get our team in the right mind set,” she said.

LSU came in second in Saturday’s finals, followed by Florida, UCLA, Utah and Alabama.

Oklahoma finished the season with a perfect 33-0 record, the first time in program history the Sooners have gone undefeated through an entire season.

The Sooners began the season as the nation’s top-ranked team. They dropped down to second after the first week, but quickly regained the top spot and never surrendered it from that point forward.

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