Utes courting elite gymnast

Two days after the highly-regarded Places Rated Almanac listed the Salt Lake City-Ogden metropolitan area as the best place to live in North America, Utah gymnastics coach Greg Marsden hopes Elise Ray sees similar qualities.

Ray has narrowed her choices down to Michigan, UCLA and Utah, and the elite level gymnast is in Salt Lake City this weekend on her official recruiting visit.If the Utes land Ray, she might be the biggest gift the storied program with 10 national championships has ever received. Ray finished eighth in the individual all-around at the World Championships in China last month and was the only American to place in the top 30. On bars, her best event, she finished seventh.

Ray trains at Hill's Angels in Maryland under Kelli Hill, the same coach who produced U.S. sensation Dominique Dawes. Ray's gymnastics style is vastly different from the powerful Dawes. She calls her style "clean and pretty."

Baring a major collapse at the U.S. National Championships next year, Ray is almost guaranteed a slot on the 2000 Olympic team that will compete in Sydney, Australia, a team that will attempt to bring home a gold like the '96 squad.

If Ray winds up on the Olympic team, and then ends up tumbling collegiality at the U., she'll be the first Olympic gymnast wowing fans in the Huntsman Center since Missy Marlowe, a gymnast who didn't have a bad post-international career winning three NCAA individual all-around national championships.