BATON ROUGE — The 10th-ranked LSU gymnastics team remains at home this weekend as No. 18 Kentucky invades the Maravich Assembly Center at 7 p.m. on Friday. Kentucky will be the Tigers’ seventh consecutive dual meet against a ranked opponent.
LSU is coming off an impressive 196.725-194.825 thrashing of No. 21 Iowa at the Assembly Center last weekend in which the Tigers scored season highs on two of four events and came up with their second best all-around score of the season.
LSU is 5-6 overall and 2-1 in SEC action, while Kentucky enters with a 7-4 mark but only a 1-2 record in conference competition.
The series between the two teams has been one-sided, as LSU owns a 42-3 advantage in the series and has won 10 consecutive decisions dating back to 1996, but 25th-year Tiger coach D-D Breaux knows that this is the best Kentucky team she’s seen in quite some time.
“They’re definitely a much stronger opponent than they have been and they come in with some solid wins under their belt so we know we’ll have to be sharp,” said LSU head coach D-D Breaux. “We need to come up with a clean performance across the board and not look ahead by any mean. We travel to No. 1 Georgia next week but we need to keep our focus on Kentucky.”
LSU will look to take advantage of the friendly confines of the Maravich Assembly Center where they are 4-0 against ranked opponents this year, including a pair of wins over top five teams. The Tigers have yet to score under 196.000 at home this season.
The Tigers got a big lift last weekend with the return of All-American Nicki Arnstad who had sat at the previous two meets with a right mid-foot sprain. The senior returned against Iowa and competed on vault and beam, as well as an exhibition performance on bars.
The Tigers will try and continue to ride the hot streak of several key athletes. Freshman Lauren Companioni has been on fire and has won or shared five individual titles over the past three weeks, while seniors Marina Degteva, Sharene Mamby and Beth Boudreaux have all been remarkably consistent multi-event scorers for the Tigers as they have three out of their last four decisions.
Following their showdown with Kentucky, LSU travels to Athens next Friday to take on No.1 Georgia. LSU has won its last three dual meets with No. 1 ranked teams, most recently earlier this season when the Tigers stunned then-No. 1 Utah.