BATON ROUGE – LSU Gymnastics senior Kiya Johnson has been named a nominee for the 2023 AAI Award, which is awarded to the top senior gymnast in the nation.
A native of Dallas, Texas, Johnson has made a name for herself since the first day she stepped on campus in 2020. A nine-time All-American, the senior has been an integral part of LSU’s success over the last four years as one of the top all-around gymnasts in the nation. She owns 40 career titles across all four events and the all-around.
In her freshman season, Johnson was crowned the 2020 SEC Freshman of the Year and Region 1 Gymnast of the Year. She joined April Burkholder as the only gymnasts in LSU history to be named the top freshman in the league. In her freshman season, she earned All-America honors on three events after finishing second in the all-around, fourth on vault and sixth on floor and recorded her first and only perfect score on vault.
In 2021, Johnson was named the SEC Specialist of the Year and the floor champion. As a sophomore, she scored three perfect 10’s on floor and became the 10th gymnast in league history to score a 10.0 on floor at SEC Championships. In her second year as a Tiger, she earned regular season All-America honors on vault and floor as well as honors on vault, floor and all-around after finishing in the top eight at NCAA Championships
Johnson recorded two perfect scores in 2022 to move her career total to seven: four on floor, two on beam and one on vault. She joined April Burkholder and Sarah Finnegan as the only gymnasts in school history with a 10.0 on three events. In her junior season, she individually represented the Tigers at the NCAA Championship, where she scored a 9.9125 at the NCAA Semifinal II championship and finished sixth overall between the two semifinals and third overall in semifinal II to earn first-team honors. The honor marked the ninth overall for Johnson, who sits at 10th all-time in LSU Gymnastics history.
On top of her perfect scores, the senior owns career highs of 9.95 on bars and 39.750 in the all-around, making her the ninth gymnast in school history to earn a score of 9.95 or higher on all four events.
As accomplished as she is on the floor, Johnson is also accomplished in the classroom as she is a three-time SEC Academic Honor Roll honoree and two-time WCGA Scholastic All-American. She graduated in August 2022 with her bachelor’s degree in sport administration and is currently pursuing her master’s in liberal arts.