NCAA gymnastics: Utah, USU and SUU gymnasts Minnesota-bound

Brigham Young University's gymnasts will have to make the long trip to Penn State University to compete with No. 1-ranked Georgia in the NCAA Northeast Regional April 12, but second-ranked University of Utah and No. 27 Southern Utah University and much of Utah State's team will compete in Minneapolis in the University of Minnesota-hosted NCAA North Central Regional.

The fields for the six six-team NCAA women's gymnastics regionals were released Monday afternoon.

The top two teams and some qualifying individuals in each regional advance to the 2008 NCAA Championships at Georgia April 24-26.

"That's kind of where we wanted to go," said Utah coach Greg Marsden. The North Central is the home region for all four teams in this state. Associate head coach Megan Marsden and assistant coach Jeff Graba both have family in the area, and Utah often competes at Minnesota due to the Marsdens' friendship with Minnesota coaches Jim and Meg Stephenson, who were former Ute assistants before taking over the Gophers.

The North Central Regional field will include the Utes, No. 11 Arkansas, No. 14 Arizona, No. 23 Iowa, Southern Utah and No. 28 Minnesota.

Utah State, which finished ranked 38th (the top 36 qualify as teams) qualified Nicki Felley and Heather Heinrich as all-around at-large competitors plus four event specialists (vault, Jasmine Minion; bars, Nicole Simoneau; beam, Lyndsie Boone; floor, Megan Tschida). Also, Aggies qualified as alternates in three events — Jackie Dillon on vault, Chelsea Marquardt on bars and Minion on floor.

Utah will open with the bye before bars and compete on bars and beam, have the bye before floor and finish up on floor and then vault.

Marsden likes that rotation because all visiting teams in regular-season dual meets start on bars, so it's familiar, and it means Utah ends up on what has been its two best events this season, floor and vault. "I don't think that's a bad draw at all," he said.

Southern Utah will open with the bye before floor, meaning it finishes the meet on beam.

At Penn State, the Cougars will get the same rotation Southern Utah has, opening with bye before floor and finishing on beam.

Other teams in the Northeast Regional with Georgia and No. 29 BYU are No. 12 Auburn, No. 13 Denver, No. 22 Penn State and No. 30 Iowa State.

The other regionals and their teams seeded in the top 18 are at LSU (No. 6 Stanford, 7 LSU, 18 Missouri), Oklahoma (No. 4 Alabama, 10 Oklahoma, 16 Boise State), Florida (No. 3 Florida, 9 UCLA, 15 Nebraska) and Oregon State (No. 5 Michigan, 8 Oregon State, 17 Michigan State).

North Central Region

Minneapolis

Teams (by seed)

1. Utah

2. Arkansas

3. Arizona

4. Iowa

5. Southern Utah

6. Minnesota

All-around competitors

1. Nicki Felley, Utah State; 2. Abigail Rogers, Air Force; 3. Heather Heinrich, Utah State; 4. Michelle Denise, Air Force; 5. Brittany Dutton, Air Force

Individual event specialists

Vault — Jasmine Minion, Utah State; Alt. — Jackie Dillon, Utah State

Uneven bars — Nicole Simoneau, Utah State; Alt. — Chelsea Marquardt, Utah State

Balance beam — Lyndsie Boone, Utah State; Alt. — Justine Weyer, Wisconsin-Whitewater, Alt. — Kayla Kincade, Air Force

Floor exercise — Megan Tschida, Utah State, Alt. — Jasmine Minion, Utah State

Northeast Region

University Park, Penn.

Teams (by seed)

1. Georgia

2. Auburn

3. Denver

4. Penn State

5. Brigham Young

6. Iowa State

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