No. 4 Buckeyes Come to Norman Saturday

No. 1/1 Oklahoma vs. No. 3/4 Ohio State

March 11 | 6:50 p.m. CT | Norman, Okla. | McCasland Field House

Live Scores

FSOK/FCSC

Notes

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MATCHUP AT A GLANCE
	Sooners	Buckeyes
Ranking	No. 1	No. 4
Season High	433.200	422.200
3-Score Avg.	431.850	418.867
Floor Avg.	71.567	70.100
Pommel Horse Avg.	71.967	70.400
Rings Avg.	73.317	69.317
Vault Avg.	73.933	70.850
Parallel Bars Avg.	72.183	71.417
High Bar Avg.	72.317	68.800

NOTES AND NUMBERS FOR MEET SEVEN

THE MEET

The No. 1-ranked Oklahoma men's gymnastics team is set to host the first of back-to-back home meets on Saturday as the No. 3/4 Ohio State Buckeyes come to Norman for a 6:50 p.m. CT meet. Competition will be held in “five-up, five-count” format, meaning all individual scores will count toward the team score. The meet will be broadcast live on FOX Sports Oklahoma and FOX College Sports Central with former Olympians and Sooner legends Bart Conner and Jake Dalton on the call.

AMERICAN CUP CHAMPION

Sophomore Yul Moldauer became the ninth Sooner champion at the AT&T American Cup on Saturday, joining a distinguished list that includes many Olympians. Moldauer scored 85.931 in the all-around to finish first, just ahead of 2016 Olympic silver medalist Oleg Vernlaiev of Ukraine. One of two American gymnasts in the nine-man field, Moldauer won the event title on floor with a 14.566 and then put up rock solid marks in the remaining five events to secure the title. The American Cup is the most prestigious meet in international gymnastics in 2017. Former winners have gone on to compete for Team USA in World Championships and Olympic Games.

NATIONAL TEAM DOMINANCE

Oklahoma made serious waves at the 2017 Winter Cup. Moldauer won the all-around competition with a two-day score of 171.750 to become the first Sooner to win the event since two-time Olympian Jake Dalton did so in 2011. Senior cocaptain Allan Bower placed third while junior Hunter Justus placed eighth to join Moldauer on the U.S. Senior National Team. Moldauer and Bower each make their second national team while Justus makes his first. In addition to the three current Sooners, four alumni, Chris Brooks, Dalton, Alex Naddour and Kanji Oyama, were also chosen for the national team, giving OU seven of the 15 total national team members.

Sophomore Peter Daggett salutes before performing on parallel bars in the Sooners' win over Air Force. Daggett has won two event titles this season, most recently winning parallel bars against Stanford.

STREAKING

The Sooners have won or finished first in every meet they have competed in since placing second at the 2014 NCAA team finals. In that span they have racked up 61 victories, the most consecutive wins in program history and the most since piling up 52 wins from 2002 to 2004.

LAST TIME OUT

The Sooners took their No. 1 ranking on the road last weekend and just held off No. 2 Stanford 432.300-432.050. With both teams competing without their top gymnasts, Oklahoma's team score was its second best so far this season while Stanford's mark bested its previous season high by nearly 10 points. OU posted the highest team score on each of the first four events, but Stanford won the last two to make a late charge. Senior Allan Bower won the all-around competition and the event title on parallel bars, senior Thao Hoang won rings, freshman Tanner Justus claimed vault and sophomore Peter Daggett took home parallel bars.

GYMNASTS OF THE WEEK

After his performance at Stanford, Allan Bower was named the NCAA Gymnast of the Week on Tuesday. The honor is Bower's second of the year, having also won the award in week one after posting an impressive all-around score of 88.750 in OU's season opener at the Rocky Mountain Open. Sooner gymnasts have now claimed NCAA Gymnast of the Week honors in six of the eight weeks it has been awarded, including after Winter Cup and all but one of their six meets. Sophomore Yul Moldauer leads the team with three awards, Bower has been honored twice and senior Colin Van Wicklen has won once.

INTERNATIONAL ASSIGNMENT

U.S. Senior National Team member Allan Bower will get his chance to wear red, white and blue next weekend when he represents the U.S. at the World Cup in Stuttgart, Germany, on March 19. The event is the second of three events in the World Cup Series, the American Cup being the first. These events are the highest level of men's gymnastics in non-Olympic years and participation and success in them helps athletes qualify for World Championship and Olympic teams in those cycles.

CODE BREAKERS

Even with scoring down under the new code of points, the Sooners are still racking up big numbers. Oklahoma is one of only two teams this season to top the 425-point mark, having done so in each of its six meets this season, including three times scoring better than 430. Oklahoma's six team scores so far this year are all in the top seven nationally this season. The Sooners also lead the nation in scoring average on every event apart from floor, where they rank third. With individual scores of 15 or better becoming scarce across the nation, the Sooners have put up 20 such marks in their six meets, including seven from sophomore Yul Moldauer.

Senior co-captain Josh Yee on parallel bars against Air Force.

SCORING CHANGE

A big storyline in 2017 will be changes made to the code of points used to score routines.

“The code of points has changed so there are only four special requirements on each apparatus instead of five,” Williams said. “Each special requirement is half a point. Basically they have combined some element groups and reduced the overall requirement. Typically we have said that a really good score is a 14.500 to a 15.000. We're going to see that same routine score between a 14.000 and a 14.500. A lot of good gymnasts are going to be doing routines that are in the high 13s. The team score is going to be affected and each individual score is going to be about a half a point lower.”

LET IT R3IGN

Oklahoma is chasing a third consecutive national championship in 2017 after completing back-to-back undefeated title runs in 2015 and 2016. The Sooners have repeated as national champions three times under Williams but have never won three in a row. The last program to accomplish that feat was Nebraska, which won five straight from 1979 to 1983. Williams was part of those Cornhusker teams as student-athlete and then as a graduate assistant. Three or more consecutive titles has only happened two other times in NCAA history (Penn State, 1959-1961; Illinois, 1939-1942).

IMPACT FRESHMEN

OU welcomes a pair of talented freshmen for 2017 in Matt Wenske and Tanner Justus. At the 2016 U.S. Championships Wenske tied Sooner great and two-time Olympian Jake Dalton for the event title on vault as a senior in high school. Justus finished first in his age group on vault at the 2013 and 2014 Men's Junior Olympic National Championships. He currently leads the nation on vault with a 3-score average of 15.050. Wenske has missed the last four meets with a knee injury.

UP NEXT

After its big road win, Oklahoma is still in the midst of a grueling schedule. The Sooners stay home next weekend to take on No. 3 Illinois on March 18 in a meet that will serve as senior night. The Sooners will have faced the second, third and fourth-ranked teams consecutively, all in the month of March.

No. 4 Buckeyes Come to Norman Saturday