Well hello! It’s the snooziest part of the pre-pre-season and there’s not much going on, but figured I’d get the thread started and let’s watch Lali’s 10 again, shall we?
UNC Gymnastics 2025-2026
- Thread starter CosmicHeel
- Start date
Everyone's favorite ex-UNC coach is back in the news: https://www.thestate.com/sports/college/acc/clemson-university/article312256195.html
Apparently (didn’t notice this when I posted yesterday) there was a second article yesterday that probes that exact question: https://www.thestate.com/sports/college/acc/clemson-university/article312256256.html
A few tidbits:
- Tomorrow (October 10) there is a public intrasquad from 2-4 PM in Fetzer C. Wish I was local! Hopefully they'll post highlights online. Not sure if BankerHeel made the move over here, but was thinking of them in particular.
- We've hosted three class of 2027 recruits so far for official visits (that I know of). One has committed elsewhere, the others appear to still be going through their visits.
- I'm admittedly very curious to know how the Olympic sports coaches are possibly tweaking their recruiting strategy to account for what a trainwreck our football program is right now. At least for gymnastics -- and assume it's the case for other sports -- fall recruiting weekends are tied to home football games. But it sounds like the game day atmosphere is REALLY bad right now. Anyone have insight on that?
I will just say that I hope that most UNC Olympic sports programs got their top recruits on campus for the TCU game (that atmosphere was electric) or can figure out how to wait for a MBB game.
2027 recruiting is generally going REALLY well for W Lax, M Lax, FH, softball and WBB off the top of my head.
UNC WBB had a large tailgate tent at the swanky Old Well lawn for the TCU game which was their biggest recruiting weekend.
2027 recruiting is generally going REALLY well for W Lax, M Lax, FH, softball and WBB off the top of my head.
UNC WBB had a large tailgate tent at the swanky Old Well lawn for the TCU game which was their biggest recruiting weekend.
Intrasquad highlights from Instagram
Vault
Vault
- Footage from Elly King (Yurchenko full) and JoJo Valahovic (Yurchenko 1.5)
- Both vaults looked very nice in the air, but vault is so hard to gauge from practice footage because in competition it's all about the landing, and they weren't landing on comp surfaces
- Valahovic had a LOT of tape on her leg
- Footage from Sydney Seabrooks, Cam Rueda(?!), Jessica Naranjo, Neve King, Molly Neinstein, Claire Stippich
- Rueda hails from a club gym with notoriously weak bars coaching and athletes from her gym rarely compete or train bars in college. Great to see her going for it, and her bars looked good!
- Would expect to see Fink and Stanley in the competition lineup but no footage from them
- Highlights were Seabrooks' double layout dismount and Naranjo's high Ray release
- This is very much not the lineup we'd be expecting to use, but the bars depth is better than I expected
- Footage from Hannah Aoki, Sydney Seabrooks, Anna Peal Stanley, Gwen Fink, Claire Stippich, Jessica Naranjo, and Elly King
- Again, some notable omissions here (McBride, Valahovic, Neve King)
- Highlights were the triple series from Fink and Stippich, Naranjo's leaps, Seabrooks' dismount, and Elly King looking much more confident
- Footage from Hannah Aoki, Anna Peal Stanley, Sydney Seabrooks, Molly Neinstein, JoJo Valajhovic, Jessica Naranjo
- Some athletes just showed choreo, others tumbling onto mats in the pit. I think Seabrooks and Naranjo were the only two shown tumbling on the floor.
- I didn't see any E passes. Not surprising -- it's early.
- Someone -- I think it was Aoki -- had a very nice front through to double tuck.
- Beam was the only event where I feel like most of the expected lineup athletes were shown. I think Beam is shaping up to be our strongest event this year
- There was no footage of Prejean, Forbes, Wozniak, McBride, Canty, or Fisher. I didn't see any casts or boots in the background though. So it's possible some of these athletes performed at the intrasquad but nothing was posted. I spotted everyone in the background except for the ever-enigmatic Canty.
- Really was hoping to see more than two vaults.
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Gymnastic tickets go on sale Thursday, Oct. 23. Following in the footsteps of women's soccer and volleyball, there are no season tickets available this year. We will have 5 home matches.
If you want to purchase tix to multiple meets, don't click on the "click here" link unless you want the system to pick your seats. Click on the header, and select each meet to pick your seats. Once you've selected the first meet and click "check out" scroll down on the cart page to select another meet; repeat for each meet to select your seats for each. This only worked on the web browser version. I couldn't find an option to select another meet w/out checking out first on the GoHeels app (YMMV).
Schedule is out! https://goheels.com/news/2025/10/23/womens-gymnastics-gymnastics-unveils-2026-schedule
This is an EXCELLENT schedule. Very pleased that we are competing in two neutral site quads, against quality opponents, prior to ACCs. It looks like the cadence for ACC competition is that each team gets a primary partner (NC State for us) where you compete against them three times: home-road-neutral. Then one competition each against the other four, alternating home and road each year.
Strongly encourage attending all meets, but would particularly recommend the home opener against Stanford. Stanford is a fantastic team that's so fun to watch and they're going to be REALLY good this year. And if you're newer to gymnastics, dual meets are more audience-friendly than tri or quad meets, which can get a bit chaotic. And if you're going to a dual meet, when picking your seats prioritize good views of beam/floor over vault/bars.
This is an EXCELLENT schedule. Very pleased that we are competing in two neutral site quads, against quality opponents, prior to ACCs. It looks like the cadence for ACC competition is that each team gets a primary partner (NC State for us) where you compete against them three times: home-road-neutral. Then one competition each against the other four, alternating home and road each year.
Strongly encourage attending all meets, but would particularly recommend the home opener against Stanford. Stanford is a fantastic team that's so fun to watch and they're going to be REALLY good this year. And if you're newer to gymnastics, dual meets are more audience-friendly than tri or quad meets, which can get a bit chaotic. And if you're going to a dual meet, when picking your seats prioritize good views of beam/floor over vault/bars.
Great format because it sets up natural rivals Pitt and Clemson
But in all seriousness this is a solid plan for cost cutting measures to limit the transcontinental travel.
It always amazes me that schools like ND, FSU, dook and SMU do not have gymnastics. But I am so glad we finally have true ACC gymnastics, and now with good teams.
I love the all SEC meet we have in Baton Rouge pretty late in the season. they should be dolling out 9.9's like candy.
@CosmicHeel the Tar Heels took a significant step forward last year. Considering the losses and what we have coming in, do you think we should be better, worse or about the same?
We'll definitely be at least a little worse on bars. One does not simply replace Dekanoidze and Schaefer. Beam I think we'll be better - we did lose a key routine in Knower but all of our freshmen are strong on beam. Floor and vault are too early to call -- a lot is going to depend on injuries and availability.Great format because it sets up natural rivals Pitt and Clemson
But in all seriousness this is a solid plan for cost cutting measures to limit the transcontinental travel.
It always amazes me that schools like ND, FSU, dook and SMU do not have gymnastics. But I am so glad we finally have true ACC gymnastics, and now with good teams.
I love the all SEC meet we have in Baton Rouge pretty late in the season. they should be dolling out 9.9's like candy.
@CosmicHeel the Tar Heels took a significant step forward last year. Considering the losses and what we have coming in, do you think we should be better, worse or about the same?
Called the ticket office today and was able to get my seats from last year back for all 5 home meets! Excited about the season, and will make sure that my seats are filled with Carolina fans for the meet that occurs when I will be in Duluth, GA cheering our women's basketball team on in the ACC tournament.
Big week for recruiting!
First, tomorrow we are expecting to sign three athletes from the high school class of 2026: Sophia Banky, Katie Cross, and Sarah Savisky. All three are rated as three-star recruits per CGN. Banky is very strong on vault, beam, and floor, with career highs of 9.7+ on all three events. Cross is a balanced all-arounder who finished 15th in her division at Nationals last year. Savisky's standout event is vault and she scored a 9.9 at nationals last year. Savisky comes from a gym where several UNC athletes trained, most recently Isabelle Schaefer.
There may be a surprise late add, but those are the three expected recruits. Barring a surprise (senior takes a fifth year, someone transfers etc) we still have five openings on the roster for next season. Durante doesn't seem inclined to recruit up to the limit, but a 15 athlete roster is a bit small and I'm hoping for more additions.
Also, both class of 2027 recruits who visited last weekend, Payton Chandler and Brielle Rousseau, announced their commitments yesterday. They are our first two class of 2027 recruits. Chandler is rated four stars per CGN and is a former elite who hasn't competed much the past couple years, likely due to injury. Because she competed elite, it's really hard to extrapolate her competition results to college due to the vastly different routine composition at the elite level. Rousseau is from the same club gym as JoJo Valahovic. Her best event appears to be bars. We went 0/4 with recruits who visited on a football weekend and 2/2 with recruits who visited on a basketball weekend. Coincidence?
Assuming everyone stays on their current graduation trajectory and no one transfers/retires, we have eight openings on the roster for the 2028 season.
First, tomorrow we are expecting to sign three athletes from the high school class of 2026: Sophia Banky, Katie Cross, and Sarah Savisky. All three are rated as three-star recruits per CGN. Banky is very strong on vault, beam, and floor, with career highs of 9.7+ on all three events. Cross is a balanced all-arounder who finished 15th in her division at Nationals last year. Savisky's standout event is vault and she scored a 9.9 at nationals last year. Savisky comes from a gym where several UNC athletes trained, most recently Isabelle Schaefer.
There may be a surprise late add, but those are the three expected recruits. Barring a surprise (senior takes a fifth year, someone transfers etc) we still have five openings on the roster for next season. Durante doesn't seem inclined to recruit up to the limit, but a 15 athlete roster is a bit small and I'm hoping for more additions.
Also, both class of 2027 recruits who visited last weekend, Payton Chandler and Brielle Rousseau, announced their commitments yesterday. They are our first two class of 2027 recruits. Chandler is rated four stars per CGN and is a former elite who hasn't competed much the past couple years, likely due to injury. Because she competed elite, it's really hard to extrapolate her competition results to college due to the vastly different routine composition at the elite level. Rousseau is from the same club gym as JoJo Valahovic. Her best event appears to be bars. We went 0/4 with recruits who visited on a football weekend and 2/2 with recruits who visited on a basketball weekend. Coincidence?
Assuming everyone stays on their current graduation trajectory and no one transfers/retires, we have eight openings on the roster for the 2028 season.
Gymnastics Adds Three Tar Heels On National Signing Day - University of North Carolina Athletics
University of North Carolina gymnastics and head coach Danna Durante announced the addition of three gymnasts from the class of 2026 Wednesday morning. Sophi...
The NCAA just announced the adoption of some significant rule changes for the upcoming season.
The one that impacts us -- and everyone -- the most is that they are changing how team NQS is calculated for postseason qualification. Previously, the NQS was calculated by taking the highest three road scores, the next three highest scores (home or road), dropping the high score, and averaging the remaining five. Our NQS going into the postseason last year was 196.470.
Under the new format, NQS is calculated by: (1) taking all road scores, (2) taking the five LOWEST home scores, (3) dropping the high and low, and (4) averaging the rest. A team must have a minimum of nine scores to have a valid NQS. Based on last year's scores, our NQS going into the postseason would have been 196.111 under this calculation. Lower, but everyone's NQS would be lower under this formula.
This is a major change. Unlike the old NQS formulation, which rewarded peak performance, this formulation rewards consistency as well. It also eliminates any incentive for teams to compete at home more than five times (AFAIK we never have). I'm interested in seeing how this impacts skill selection and lineup strategy. This does mean that we -- and everyone else -- can only afford one stinker of a meet before postseason prospects are impacted. It also means that NQS has the potential to decrease throughout the season -- under the prior formulation, it could only stay the same or rise from week to week. This should make postseason prognostication significantly more complicated
The old NQS formula will still be used for individual qualification to the postseason, which I think is a fair balance.
In conjunction with this rule change, the NCAA also adopted new rules governing what counts as a road meet, but that rule change was primarily targeted at one team and shouldn't impact us.
The one that impacts us -- and everyone -- the most is that they are changing how team NQS is calculated for postseason qualification. Previously, the NQS was calculated by taking the highest three road scores, the next three highest scores (home or road), dropping the high score, and averaging the remaining five. Our NQS going into the postseason last year was 196.470.
Under the new format, NQS is calculated by: (1) taking all road scores, (2) taking the five LOWEST home scores, (3) dropping the high and low, and (4) averaging the rest. A team must have a minimum of nine scores to have a valid NQS. Based on last year's scores, our NQS going into the postseason would have been 196.111 under this calculation. Lower, but everyone's NQS would be lower under this formula.
This is a major change. Unlike the old NQS formulation, which rewarded peak performance, this formulation rewards consistency as well. It also eliminates any incentive for teams to compete at home more than five times (AFAIK we never have). I'm interested in seeing how this impacts skill selection and lineup strategy. This does mean that we -- and everyone else -- can only afford one stinker of a meet before postseason prospects are impacted. It also means that NQS has the potential to decrease throughout the season -- under the prior formulation, it could only stay the same or rise from week to week. This should make postseason prognostication significantly more complicated
The old NQS formula will still be used for individual qualification to the postseason, which I think is a fair balance.
In conjunction with this rule change, the NCAA also adopted new rules governing what counts as a road meet, but that rule change was primarily targeted at one team and shouldn't impact us.
Wow. Yeah it sounds like having more than 5 home meets only creates risk for a bad score that counts. Hypothetically, what happens if you have only 4 home meets? do you lose the ability to drop the lowest score?
And it also sound like there is even more incentive to keep the routines conservative? Overall, less Yurchenko One and a halfs? Or am I reading too much into this?
And one particularly bad day on beam can now affect your post season?
Suddenly those early season meets that often get tossed now really matter. For us, at least one of our two January home meets (vs Stanford and vs Pitt) is guaranteed to count. So teams who are running strong in January will get a head start that likely will matter a lot.
On the bright side, it seems like this removes some of the late season SEC score inflation a little.
And it also sound like there is even more incentive to keep the routines conservative? Overall, less Yurchenko One and a halfs? Or am I reading too much into this?
And one particularly bad day on beam can now affect your post season?
Suddenly those early season meets that often get tossed now really matter. For us, at least one of our two January home meets (vs Stanford and vs Pitt) is guaranteed to count. So teams who are running strong in January will get a head start that likely will matter a lot.
On the bright side, it seems like this removes some of the late season SEC score inflation a little.
No, you can still drop the low score regardless of the home/away composition of your meets, you just can't count more than five home meets and if a team insists on having 6+ meets at home, only the five worst scores will count. In theory, a team could compete at home four times, on the road six times, and have their high/low drop scores both be home meets such that only two home meets end up counting.
I'm curious about this too. Within each meet, teams will still be able to drop the low score in each rotation which leaves some room for risk-taking. But what I think this means is that any team with an uncharacteristically low score in an early meet (like UCLA which opened with a disastrous-for-them 195.25 last year) will need to play it safer for the rest of the season because they know every meet for the rest of the season will count.
It also means that teams no longer have the luxury of a slow start to the season -- Stanford in particular is known for this. Teams are going to need to put their best lineups and skills out there very early.
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this line really caught my eye. it seems like we now have zero opportunity for a meet where we experiment with a couple of freshmen/transfers to see what they can do. because any flub #2 on an apparatus will count for the season.
I know we can put up exhibition routines on any apparatus for practice, but that is not exactly the same "game pressure."
Gymnastics Picked Fourth In ACC Preseason Poll - University of North Carolina Athletics
In a vote from league coaches, UNC was picked to finish fourth with three Tar Heels making the preseason watch lists. Seniors Gwen Fink and Kaya Forbes were ...
Clemson stole Cal's coaches, some of their roster... and their 2nd place spot in the conference (preseason al least.)Gymnastics Picked Fourth In ACC Preseason Poll - University of North Carolina Athletics
In a vote from league coaches, UNC was picked to finish fourth with three Tar Heels making the preseason watch lists. Seniors Gwen Fink and Kaya Forbes were ...goheels.com
This roster is a mix of what the previous coach brought with her from Utah St (4 gymnasts and I think 2 recruits who decommitted from USU?) and the new coaches brought from Cal (1 gymnast and two recruits committed to Cal)
The Utah State transfers are starting to cycle out (they all had to burn their redshirt year when they transferred). Four of the six transfers are still on the roster, plus Lilly Lippeatt who burned a redshirt year and was on "team zero" after leaving LSU during her freshman preseason.
Preseason coaches' polls are inherently silly, particularly for small conferences. Because we're told who got first-place votes and the vote totals, we can reverse-engineer some of the ballots. UNC and State got the only non-Stanford first place votes (probably from their respective coaches) and Pitt got a rogue third place vote (probably from their own coach). That throws off all the numbers for everyone else.
It's a safe bet that Stanford will be #1 and Pitt will be #6, and how the four middle teams shake out is a total crapshoot.
Preseason coaches' polls are inherently silly, particularly for small conferences. Because we're told who got first-place votes and the vote totals, we can reverse-engineer some of the ballots. UNC and State got the only non-Stanford first place votes (probably from their respective coaches) and Pitt got a rogue third place vote (probably from their own coach). That throws off all the numbers for everyone else.
It's a safe bet that Stanford will be #1 and Pitt will be #6, and how the four middle teams shake out is a total crapshoot.
The WCGA Coaches' Poll is out (this is the poll of all the coaches) and the results are quite similar to the ACC poll:
13. Stanford
19. Clemson
20. Cal
23. NCSU
24. UNC
Pitt was "also receiving votes" (36 teams are ranked). The difference between 19th and 24th in the final standings is typically minimal, which underscores how close the competition will be between the middle four ACC teams.
13. Stanford
19. Clemson
20. Cal
23. NCSU
24. UNC
Pitt was "also receiving votes" (36 teams are ranked). The difference between 19th and 24th in the final standings is typically minimal, which underscores how close the competition will be between the middle four ACC teams.
The season has started! The first ACC team (Cal) has its meet today -- it's paywalled and I won't be watching. Clemson kicks off tomorrow. UNC kicks off next Friday (the 9th) and the other ACC teams start their seasons next weekend as well.
Lineups for tonight's season opener! Note: I have no idea what event we start on, only that it won't be vault. Looks like probably bars
Vault: Elly King, Fink, Prejean, Valahovic, Seabrooks, Forbes (Neve King exhibition)
Bars: Neve King, Stanley, Stippich, Prejean, Fink, Forbes (Seabrooks exhibition)
Beam: Seabrooks, Neve King, Aoki, Naranjo, Valahovic, Fink (Stippich exhibition)
Floor: Elly King, Fink, Aoki, Naranjo, Forbes, Seabrooks (Neinstein exhibition)
The headlines here are:
Vault: Elly King, Fink, Prejean, Valahovic, Seabrooks, Forbes (Neve King exhibition)
Bars: Neve King, Stanley, Stippich, Prejean, Fink, Forbes (Seabrooks exhibition)
Beam: Seabrooks, Neve King, Aoki, Naranjo, Valahovic, Fink (Stippich exhibition)
Floor: Elly King, Fink, Aoki, Naranjo, Forbes, Seabrooks (Neinstein exhibition)
The headlines here are:
- Fink back in the all-around after only competing it once(?) last year
- Seabrooks anchoring floor over Forbes
- Valahovic not competing floor (you ok???)
- Prejean making the bars lineup over Seabrooks.
- Prejean making the bars lineup period, actually. I did not have that on my bingo card at all.
- Molly Neinstein!
Wow, pretty huge day. Career high vault and AA from Fink. Tied career high vault for Forbes. Tied career high floor for Naranjo. Tied career high vault for Prejean. Seabrooks opens her career with a 9.95 floor event win. This would've tied for our 3rd best score last year, T10th in school history,...and we counted a 9.575 on Beam...WOW.
Gymnastics Sets Program Record In Season Opener - University of North Carolina Athletics
The Tar Heels set a program record for a season-opening score on the road, shattering their previous team record by 1.5 points. Carolina came in second at th...
What a night for our gymnastics team!Gymnastics Sets Program Record In Season Opener - University of North Carolina Athletics
The Tar Heels set a program record for a season-opening score on the road, shattering their previous team record by 1.5 points. Carolina came in second at th...
Not sure why they keep touting the “best *road* opener in history” talking point. It was our best opening score period!
Incredible start to the season. Out of 20 counted scores, only 3 were below 9.8. Really awesome.
We shouldn't lose sight of the fact that this meet was held in the ODome. And ODome judges are certainly...renowned for their generosity.
That said, of the full UNC routines that were shown (I don't think we got anyone's beam from start to finish) the only UNC routine that really jumped out to me as an obvious overscore was Prejean's bars. And that's not to take anything away from Prejean -- I'm still blown away that they're debuting a new event as a senior and doing it so well. But that dismount was a bit out of control and IMO that routine wasn't a 9.8. The rest looked reasonable, with the caveat that the camera work was pretty terrible at this meet and that made things harder to assess.
It was an incredible start and I can't wait to see what this team accomplishes.
Figured I'd also throw out my top "unintentional comedy" moments of the meet because gymnastics absolutely is an unintentional comedy and knowing where to look for it makes watching the sport 100x more fun. My top two UNC-related things were:
That said, of the full UNC routines that were shown (I don't think we got anyone's beam from start to finish) the only UNC routine that really jumped out to me as an obvious overscore was Prejean's bars. And that's not to take anything away from Prejean -- I'm still blown away that they're debuting a new event as a senior and doing it so well. But that dismount was a bit out of control and IMO that routine wasn't a 9.8. The rest looked reasonable, with the caveat that the camera work was pretty terrible at this meet and that made things harder to assess.
It was an incredible start and I can't wait to see what this team accomplishes.
Figured I'd also throw out my top "unintentional comedy" moments of the meet because gymnastics absolutely is an unintentional comedy and knowing where to look for it makes watching the sport 100x more fun. My top two UNC-related things were:
- During Molly Neinstein's floor exhibition (good for her, btw) Florida's Clueless Male Announcer mixed up her info sheet with Riley McCusker's (Florida gymnast) and started rattling off "Molly's" accomplishments as a member of the US national team.
- I'm pretty sure I saw two separate UNC gymnasts accidentally punch a teammate in the face while celebrating after routines.
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