BATON ROUGE — Coming off back-to-back NCAA Super Six appearances, the preseason sixth-ranked LSU gymnastics team will open the 2010 season at 7 p.m. CT Friday against Maryland in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
D-D Breaux will begin her 33rd season as head coach, and her team returns four All-American seniors in Sabrina Franceschelli, Summer Hubbard, Susan Jackson and Kayla Rogers who were integral parts in leading the Tigers to the Super Six in 2008 and 2009.
All fans in attendance will receive free hot chocolate, and groups of 10 or more fans will receive free admission to the meet. The first 500 fans will also receive a free Super Tiger Fan t-shirt.
“We are excited that our first meet is at home,” Breaux said. “We never open at home. The team is very excited about this season. We are returning a host of very solid, not only good gymnasts but extremely good people. Our seniors have been outstanding leaders and have made a huge impact.”
Overall, eight returning letterwinners will blend together with five freshmen to give the Tigers a mix of experience and youth throughout the season.
Headlining the returning letterwinners are the four seniors, led by Jackson who won the 2008 vault national title and finished runner up last season. Hubbard was a First Team All-American on bars in 2008 and 2009, while Franceschelli earned All-America honors in the all-around and Rogers was an All-American on floor.
The lone junior on the squad is Samantha Engle who is expected to provide the Tigers excellent skill on bars, beam and floor.
After redshirting in 2009 with a broken ankle, sophomore Nikki Lyons will return to competition against Maryland.
Sophomore Gloria Johnson was named the SEC Freshman of the Week twice last season, and LSU will count on her experience on vault and beam.
Sophomore Ashley Lee will look to make a splash in the vault lineup and will add depth to the other lineups.
Even though the coaches have high hopes for the freshman class, two of them – Kaleigh Dickson and Lainie Fleming – will miss some time this season because of recent injuries. Dickson injured her knee less than a month ago and is expected to miss six to eight weeks while Fleming injured her wrist and will be out for an undisclosed amount of time.
Ericka Garcia was a late addition to the team and will be eligible to compete at the halfway point of the season, and freshmen Janelle Garcia and Shelby Prunty will make contributions in the lineups throughout the season.
“We are bringing our freshmen along, and they will continue to get stronger as the season progresses,” Breaux said. “It’s not how we start. It’s how we finish, and traditionally with our gymnastics team it’s our coaching style to bring them around slowly and get better as our season goes on.”
Maryland returns 12 letterwinners this season from a team that finished 15-19 in 2009 and advanced to NCAA regional competition.
The Terrapins are led by first-year head coach Brett Nelligan who enters his seventh season with the team, the first six as an assistant coach.
LSU will offer a special assistance bus shuttle for all gymnastics home meets. The premeet shuttle will begin one and a half hours before the meet, and the postmeet shuttle will resume after the third rotation.
Live video and stats of the meet will be available all season in the Geaux Zone on LSUsports.net.
Tiger fans can sign up to follow the LSU gymnastics team all season on twitter by going to twitter.com/LSUgym.