UPSET: #4 Bama Wins SEC's in a Nail-Biter

Mar 22, 2014 by Brittany Norton

Tonight the #4 Alabama Crimson Tide pulled off a thrilling upset of #1 Florida and #3 LSU in Birmingham to win the 2014 SEC Championships. The Tide posted an impressive 197.875, but trailed Florida for the first three rotations of the competition. Florida, the defending SEC Champions, placed second with a 197.700 followed by LSU in third with a 197.325. Florida’s Bridget Sloan won the All Around title with a 39.700 followed by teammate Kytra Hunter with a 39.650 and Kim Jacob of Alabama with a 39.600.

Florida went lights out on their first two rotations, vault and bars, and began to pull away from the competition. Head coach Rhonda Faehn said she thought her team had their best bars and beam performances all year. However, it all came down to the very last rotation.

Florida was only ahead of Alabama by 0.125 going into rotation four. It was close enough to be anyone’s competition, and LSU was only 0.425 behind Alabama.

Alabama ended the competition on the uneven bars in an arena filled with almost 8,000 screaming Alabama Crimson Tide fans. With the championship title on the line head coach Sarah Patterson told her team to hold nothing back...and the Tide did exactly that. Alabama's complete bar line-up scored a 9.9 or above. Kaitlyn Clark rounded out the tides final score with an impressive 9.975, receiving 10.0’s from two judges.

It seemed that the Tide was drawing its energy from the home crowd and sticking nearly every dismount. However, some of the routines with tiny steps on the dismounts and handstands not to 180 degrees, may have had inflated scores. With that aside, Alabama did have the performance of a lifetime and enjoyed a win in front of the ecstatic home crowd.

While Alabama was having a sort of “stick-fest” on bars, Florida was finishing off on their best event, the floor exercise.

Claire Boyce/©Erin Long

Beginning with Claire Boyce, a freshman who has lead the floor lineup all season and had no misses. Tonight was a different story. Boyce landed short on her last pass and touched her hands down scoring only a 9.2. From that point on Florida knew they could make no mistakes. It almost seemed like a repeat of last years NCAA Championship, when Florida started with a fall on floor and was forced to overcome the adversity.

The Gators left everything out on the floor and were rewarded by a 9.9 from Alaina Johnson, a 9.925 from Sloan, and a title winning 9.950 from Hunter. Bridgey Caquatto was the last to solidify the Gators score and unfortunately stepped out of bounds for a 0.1 deduction.

Simple mistakes lead to the Gators demise and allowed for Alabama to skate on by for the win. Florida Head Coach Rhonda Faehn said, “We know that winning this conference is so hard. You cannot afford to count a mistake because that will take you down in the rankings. This result is just going to fuel our athletes to come out fighting really hard at regionals and nationals.”

LSU’s coach D-D Breaux was upset by her teams’ uncharacteristic mistakes. The Tigers had a fall from Jessie Jordan on beam, and Maliah Mathis stepped out of bounds on floor. Overall the team suffered from a few balance checks on beam and missed several sticks. The little things added up in the end and they let their momentum slip.

It wasn’t all-bad for the Tigers, they still had some great performances. Lloimincia Hall tied with Hunter for the floor title with a 9.950. Jessie Jordan received a 10.0 from one judge and scored a 9.95 on vault.

Georgia’s Lauren Johnson received a huge reaction from the crowd when she earned two 10.0’s from the vault judges resulting in a huge 9.975 and an event title. Georgia absolutely dominated bars scoring a 9.9 or higher for every routine, including the 9.95’s from Lindsey Cheek, Kiera Brown, and Chelsea Davis. Georgia’s bar set of 49.7 actually scored higher than Alabama’s 49.65, but unfortunately was overshadowed by the Tides win.

Floor was the Gym Dogs weakest link as they didn’t post a single 9.9 and had an athlete step out of bounds. Their highest floor score was a 9.825 from Brandie Jay.

RESULTS

Team

1. Alabama 197.875

2. Florida 197.70

3. LSU 197.325

4. Georgia 197.15

5. Auburn 195.55

6. Kentucky 195.075

7. Arkansas 194.90

8. Mizzouri 194.65

SEC Event Champions
All Around: Bridget Sloan (Florida) 39.70
Vault: TIE Diandra Milliner (Alabama) and Lauren Johnson (Georgia) 9.975
Uneven Bars: Katilyn Clark (Alabama) 9.975
Beam: Kytra Hunter (Florida) 9.925
Floor: Kytra Hunter ( Florida), Diandra Milliner (Alabama) and Lloimincia Hall (LSU) 9.95