Gymnastics : Illinois Ends Bruins’ Streak to Win UCLA Meet

UCLA was about to retire the trophy, having already won its invitational six consecutive times. But nothing(see: basketball) is forever.

Illinois, second-place finisher in last year’s National Collegiate Athletic Assn. championships, roared in to win the men’s gymnastics meet Saturday night, and, on top of that, NCAA defending champion Nebraska finished strong in its final event to finish ahead of the Bruins in second place.

So UCLA, which had finished third in last year’s NCAA championships but which returned most of its team, finally loosened its grip in Pauley Pavilion, finishing with a total of 277.85 to Illinois’ 279.05 and Nebraska’s 278.65.

Of course, this is the equivalent of an exhibition game in the gymnastics season, so early is the meet. And nobody was awarding any championships on the basis of these scores, so close are these teams in talent.

“Whoever has the best night,” Nebraska Coach Frances Allen was saying before the meet, “wins. That’s all.”

Illinois Coach Yoshi Hayasaki more or less agreed. “We expected to be good,” he said, “but we are keeping our eyes on UCLA and Nebraska. UCLA can do a lot better, they’re not at full strength. Very talented. Still, we will take it.”

UCLA was on its way to doing a lot better but suffered a number of breaks on floor exercise in their third rotation. After that, the lead began to slip away.

“Even though we were still leading after floor,” UCLA Coach Art Shurlock said, “we could have been leading by more. We didn’t help ourselves there. We could have built up a pretty good lead.”

The Bruins nearly slipped into second at that point, but the Cornhuskers finished strong in floor, its last event, and went past them.

Nebraska, which will once again play host to the NCAA championships in mid-April, was boosted by the individual performances of Patrick Kirksey and Mike Epperson. In fact, Kirksey was the all-around winner with a score of 56.85. Kirksey also won the parallel pars with a score of 9.55 and tied for first on floor with a score of 9.70. Teammate Epperson finished sixth in the all-around with a score of 55.80. David Zeddes of Illinois placed second with a score of 56.65.

UCLA’s David St. Pierre was third at 56.20.

Although these three teams could rearrange themselves in order come the NCAAs, you can expect them to be at least among the top five or so. One other thing you might expect, is that Illinois will improve.

“I predicted they’d be the favorite anyway,” Shurlock said. “They finished second in the NCAAs, and their redshirts are better than the people they lost.”

What’s more, Illinois has been operating without Olympian Dominic Minicucci. He had been suffering from a shoulder injury since the 1988 NCAA meet, but it wasn’t operated on until this season. “What was I going to do,” the sophomore said. “The Olympics were my whole life.”