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Preview: MSU gymnastics heads to Big Ten Championship as No. 1 seed

March 18, 2023
Head coach Mike Rowe during a team circle before the beginning of the MSU V. Penn State meet, held at the Jenison Fieldhouse on Feb.4, 2022
Head coach Mike Rowe during a team circle before the beginning of the MSU V. Penn State meet, held at the Jenison Fieldhouse on Feb.4, 2022

After a historic regular season that included claiming the co-Big Ten regular season title, the Michigan State gymnastics team has one last conference conquest before Nationals—the Big Ten Championship.

The Spartans will be competing in the second and final session of the championship in Coralville, Iowa on Saturday evening as the No. 1 seed after an 8-1 conference run.

The second session of the Big Ten Championship will be a head to head battle between MSU, No. 2 Michigan, No. 3 Iowa and No. 4 Ohio State.

The end of the Spartan’s regular season was full of jaw-dropping performance after jaw-dropping performance, and if the green and white is able to keep that momentum throughout the championship meet, they should be setting themselves up for a decently successful evening.

In the last two meets of the regular season, Michigan State broke six program records including broken records on three apparatuses, the first ever perfect 10.000 on bars from senior Jori Jackard and a 198.225 program-high final score.

The only event that the Spartan’s did not set a program record for over the last two meets was on floor, but they still managed to tie their 49.675 high score.

Earlier in the season, Michigan State came out victorious over every single Big Ten team except for an uncharacteristically low scoring meet at Iowa. In the meet against Iowa, the Spartans logged their only score below 196.000 all season with a final score of 195.725.

The only Big Ten team currently ranked ahead of No. 9 MSU in the national standings is No. 2 Michigan. In their last matchup earlier in the season, the Spartans took down the Wolverines 197.200-196.975 in the rivalry-showdown.

Sophomore Gabrielle Stephen is arguably the most consistent of Michigan State’s all-around competitors, and is the highest ranked Spartan in the national rankings at No. 21. Freshman Nikki Smith follows close behind at No. 23, and sophomore Skyla Schulte sits at No. 28.

The only gymnasts in the Big Ten ranked above Stephen and Smith are three from Michigan—senior Sierra Brooks, graduate student Natalie Wojcik and graduate student Abby Heiskell.

The first session of the Big Ten Championship will take place at 12 p.m. ET on Saturday March 18 also in Coralville. Session one will feature Penn State, Illinois, Maryland, Nebraska, Minnesota and Rutgers.

About five and a half hours after session one kicks off, Michigan State will take to the floor for the second session. Session two will take place at Xtream Arena at 5:30 p.m. on Saturday evening. Both sessions are set to be broadcast on the Big Ten Network.

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