OU Finishes Third in Championship

April 17, 2009

MINNEAPOLIS, Minn. -- The University of Oklahoma men's gymnastics team tallied 361.200 points to finish third at the 2009 NCAA Championship in Minneapolis, Minn. at the Sports Pavilion. Stanford (362.800) claimed the national championship, as Michigan (361.500) finished second, with California (361.150) in fourth. Illinois (359.30) and Ohio State (355.950) finished fifth and sixth, respectively.

"I can't complain, our guys had a great meet," said head coach Mark Williams. "It may have been one of our highest scores of the season but other teams were rocking out there as well."

Sophomore Steven Legendre claimed the NCAA title in the all-around with a score of 90.500 as a total of six OU gymnasts qualified for the individual event finals. Oklahoma finished first on floor (62.750) and vault (64.050) on the night.

"It was definitely exciting to win the all-around tonight," said sophomore Steven Legendre. "It felt like all my hard work came together in the end." "Unfortunately it is overshadowed by not winning the team championship, which was our main goal for the weekend."

Steven Legendre, Chris Brooks, Kyle McNamara, Russell Czeschin, Bobby Shortle, and Jacob Messina will compete tomorrow in the individual championships as the top eight competing in each event will be crowned All-Americans. Legendre will be competing for three individual titles tomorrow as his will look to add to his two already.

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The Sooners started the night on parallel bars with steady performances coming from senior Kyle McNamara (14.800) and Brooks (14.650). Legendre added a 14.550 and senior Jason Laughton scored a 14.100 to round out Oklahoma's team score of 58.250.

Oklahoma then moved to high bar, turning in a 58.450 to finish the event. Strong performances came from McNamara and Legendre posting scores of 14.700.

After two strong opening performances, OU then moved to floor scoring a season team high score of 62.750 and received career high performances from sophomore Bobby Shortle and Brooks when they scored a 15.550 and 15.650, respectively. Steven Legendre capped the event off by scoring a season high 16.000.

After a bye rotation, OU went to pommel horse and did what they needed to do posting score of 57.750. Key performances came from Laughton and senior Jacob Messina, with scores of 14.400 and 14.950, respectively.

Oklahoma scored a 59.950 on rings with McNamara matching a career high of 15.000. Messina also posted a solid score of 15.250.

On the final event, OU scored a 64.050 on vault with Legendre and senior Russell Czeschin turning in scores of 16.300 and 16.050.

"Stanford is definitely the deserving champion, added Williams. "We did as well as we could do, it just didn't go our way in the end."

Saturday night's competition is slated for a 7 p.m. start inside the Sports Pavilion. Live scoring of the event can be accessed as part of the NCAA Championship Central page on www.gophersports.com.

ESPN2 (Cox Channel 28, HD Channel 721 in OKC) will air the Team and All-Around Finals on April 23 at 2 p.m.

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