Trani interviews Kupets

Everyone wants a Courtney Kupets update. Here it is, courtesy of Georgia freshman Amber Trani, who calls Kupets her “big sister” on the team.

How is your Achilles doing?
CK- It’s doing very well. I’m still doing a bit of rehab and am just now progressing onto hard surfaces. But slowly so I don’t go too hard and it swells up.

What are your thoughts on the upcoming season?
CK- I’m very excited for it. There’s still a lot of work to be done. But I’m excited for the new team and to build the new chemistry because until season starts you don’t really know how it’s going to be.

How have practices been going for you as well as the rest of the team?
CK- Practices for me still are either on or off. I guess it’s because of coming back from an injury. I need to be more consistent. Beam has been solid and I’m confident on that. And the team, we’ve started inner-squads. The first ones were pretty much what I expected but now it is picking up and getting to be what we want.

What do you think will be the toughest challenge?
CK- Well already [Courtney] McCool being out has been difficult. But we really need to not get ahead of ourselves. There’s going to be hard times and easy times and fun times. We can’t get over anxious about anything that occurs. That’ll be our toughest challenge.

Other interesting tidbits: Kupets says she couldn’t live without her coffee maker. I’m still amazed that gymnasts drink coffee. On Ellen, Carly Patterson once said she’d been drinking coffee from a pretty young age, and Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson were spotted this summer getting their Starbucks fix. Trani aspires to be a sports reporter. In five years, she hopes to be working for Sports Illustrated or ESPN.

Kupets’s new floor routine (and many others from Georgia) are available on Gymnastike.

NCAA Gymnastics Championships: Game on

One of the biggest questions about the 2008 NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Championships, which begins today in Athens, Ga., is whether Ashley Postell will finally get the NCAA all-around crown many think she richly deserves.

Postell has been Utah’s beacon — and one of the big names in collegiate gymnastics — for the past four years. But she’s always been eclipsed (twice by friend and former teammate Courtney Kupets) for the NCAA all-around title.

Courtney McCool’s bars

From last weekend’s SEC Championships:

Like Oklahoma’s Hollie Vise, McCool’s excellent form has remained intact despite the fact that she’s grown a bit since 2004. And she has great control on her full-twisting double layout dismount.

Courtney McCool, 2004 Olympics Team Qualifications, Uneven Bars:

According to the GymInfo NCAA Gymnastics Rankings, McCool is first in the nation on floor exercise and tied for sixth on balance beam. She has the makings of a fine all-around gymnast if only she did vault.

Her Yurchenko full, the standard NCAA vault, is pretty good, if memory serves.

Courtney McCool, 2002 U.S. Championships, Vault:

Utah’s April Fools article

The April Fool’s edition is a tradition at many college newspapers. On April 1, student journalists fill a real version of their newspaper with fake news. It’s a great opportunity to be creative in places where “news” stories are often less than fascinating.

The Daily Utah Chronicle has run an April Fool’s piece today on the Utah women’s gymnastics team, highlighting Sarah Shire’s departure from the team last season.

Terin Humphrey: The moments

Carly Patterson was the “it” girl, the one with the big chance to become the next Mary Lou Retton.

Courtney McCool was the upstart senior with the impeccable form who some thought could win it all for herself.

Courtney Kupets was an amazing comeback story — the girl who had weathered a potentially career-ending injury and come back better than she’d been before, all in less than a year.

Mohini Bhardwaj had defied all odds and made an Olympic team eight years after she was expected to be at her prime.

Annia Hatch was living the American dream.

And Terin Humphrey was the girl, who despite not being a particular Olympic favorite (some doubted she’d make the team, given that the USA had so much talent to choose from) wound up standing on a podium in Athens all by herself with a silver medal around her neck.

New 2008 floor routines…

From Courtney McCool at Georgia…

Georgia beats Florida — by a very narrow margin

No. 1 Florida came this close to upsetting no. 2 Georgia at home Friday night.

More than 10,000 turned out to see the Gators duel the Gym Dogs in the hottest matchup in college gymnastics right now. But once again, Georgia came out on top, 196.850 t0 195.825. It doesn’t really get any smaller than that.

Both teams had a number of unaccustomed mistakes. Florida counted a fall for the first time in 28 meets, that mistake coming on the uneven bars. Georgia’s Grace Taylor and Courtney McCool both fell from the balance beam during the final rotation.

Florida star Corey Hartung won the all-around with a 39.7, the fifth-highest score in school history. Courtney Kupets was second with a 39.65, and Georgia junior Tiffany Tolnay was third with a 39.525.

Further reading: Georgia’s press release, Florida’s press release

Rebounding Georgia bests no. 5 Stanford

Another day, another top-five ranked team, and the Georgia Gym Dogs look back on track.

That’s the general consensus after Georgia defeated no. 5 Stanford in Palo Alto Jan. 13, 196.875-196.150. But it was the Cardinal that had the high team score on vault (49.275) and beam (49.15), while Georgia was tops on bars (49.225) and floor (49.3).

Georgia junior Courtney Kupets, who had some rare mistakes during Georgia’s season-opener at Utah Friday night, appeared more her usual self, winning the all-around with a 39.550. Georgia’s Tiffany Tolnay and Stanford’s Nicole Ourada tied for second with 39.3.

Stanford sophomore Carly Janiga was best on beam with a 9.9. Grace Taylor won bars with a 9.9, Kupets took vault with a 9.925 and she, 2004 Olympic teammate Courtney McCool and Georgia newcomer Cassidy McComb shared top honors on floor, each with a 9.9.

Redshirt freshman Allyse Ishino, who was sidelined with blood clots in the lungs while training in 2006 made an impressive debut for the Cardinal, scoring a 9.875 on vault and a 9.9 on bars. Stanford senior Tabitha Yim, who has been the backbone of the team since 2005, only competed floor exercise (9.775.)

Georgia opens 2008 campaign with loss to Utah

The top-ranked Georgia Gym Dogs lost their season-opener to third-ranked Utah at the University of Utah Friday night.

But not by much. The final score was 196.3-196.2, Utah was at home, and Georgia was mostly without sophomore Grace Taylor, who competed uneven bars only, and senior Megan Dowlen. It’s likely that those two, particularly Taylor, would have made the difference in the meet.

Utah senior Ashley Postell, who clinched Utah’s win during her floor exercise in the final rotation (9.9), won the all-around, balance beam and floor. Ute standout Kristina Baskett was second and Georgia junior Tiffany Tolnay third, leaving Olympic silver and bronze medalist Courtney Kupets fourth.

No. 1 Georgia vs. No. 3 Utah — tonight!

For all the talk in gymnastics about competing against yourself and just doing your best, it’s refreshing to see an article like Lya Wodraska’s in this morning’s Salt Lake Tribune shooting all of that to hell.

College gymnastics is about scores, not settling scores. It’s about getting to nationals, not getting the best of your opponent, about concentrating on the best you can do, not what your opponent is doing.

Then there are meets between the University of Utah and the University of Georgia, where conventional wisdom is ignored, emotions run high and success is judged by showing up one another, great score be damned.

“If you gave me an option of getting a 197 and losing or a 194 and winning, I’d take the win in a heartbeat,” Georgia coach Suzanne Yoculan said. “I’m not about vanilla and fluff, I want the win.”

And so do the Utes, who are willing to agree with their biggest rival in philosophy, if only for a night.

“I get her point and I couldn’t agree more,” said Utah coach Greg Marsden, who sported an “I hate the SEC” T-shirt at practice Thursday.

Despite pre-season rankings, the Gym Dogs and the Utes are more or less 1-2 in the nation in a lot of people’s minds, making both teams’ season-opener one of the more interesting meets of the season.

Advantage on this one probably goes to Utah, who are a) at home and b) not as injury-plauged as Georgia, who will be competing without sophomore Grace Taylor, senior Megan Dowlen and junior Tiffany Tolnay. Taylor and Dowlen have sprained ankles and Tolnay is sick, according to a UGA press release.

Never count Georgia out, however. The Gym Dogs certainly have the depth to get it done. Junior Courtney Kupets is training some of the hardest stuff in the NCAA, and she’ll be backed up by a more or less healthy Katie Heenan and sophomore Olympian Courtney McCool.

Utah, meanwhile, will compete big guns Ashley Postell and Kristina Baskett and likely also expects huge performances from Annie DeLuzio and Katie Kivisto.