BATON ROUGE – LSU gymnastics senior Ashleigh Gnat has been named one of seven finalists for the 2017 AAI Award, which is given to the most outstanding senior female gymnast in the country, it was announced Thursday.
Gnat has been at the forefront of LSU’s ascension to one of the top gymnastics programs in the country. A vocal senior leader, Gnat led the program to a historic sweep of the Southeastern Conference championships in 2017.
The Lake Mary, Florida native captured the SEC event titles on vault, beam and floor just last weekend. Gnat anchored beam and floor with a 9.95 and also stuck her vault for a 10.0. Her three event titles tied Rheagan Courville (2014) for the most by an LSU gymnast at the SEC meet in school history.
For her career, Gnat owns nine perfect 10.0 scores, which is tied with Jennifer Wood for the most in school history. Gnat is the No. 1 vault performer in the country this season with three perfect scores and at least a 9.90 in every meet this season on the event.
Gnat is a regular season All-American on three events after wrapping up with the No. 1 ranking on vault, No. 4 ranking on floor and No. 8 ranking on beam. Gnat’s 14 total All-America honors so far are tied for the second-most in school history.
The three-event specialist owns 10 floor titles for the season, which also ties the school record for the most in a single season in school history. In LSU’s career titles rankings, Gnat sits at No. 5 on floor with 21 titles, No. 6 on vault with 22 titles and No. 7 on beam with 12 titles. Gnat also ranks eighth in school history with 60 total titles.
In addition to her success in the gym, Gnat is also an outstanding student and member of the Baton Rouge community. Gnat has been a part of three-straight Tiger Cup wins, which is awarded to the LSU team that owns the highest team GPA along with the most community service hours.
She is a three-time SEC Academic Honor Roll member and was named an Academic All-American in 2016. Gnat will graduate in May 2017 with a degree in sports administration.
The second-ranked LSU gymnastics team travels to Nebraska for the NCAA Lincoln Regional at 4 p.m. CT on April 1. The two top teams out of the regional will advance to the NCAA Semifinal on April 14 in St. Louis, Missouri.
Fans can follow the Tigers on the team’s social media channels: @LSUgym on Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat, www.Facebook.com/lsugym and at YouTube.com/lsugymnastics.