University of Georgia Athletics
2005 Season Review
October 23, 2006 | Gymnastics
Schedule and Results | Roster |
2005 Season Review
Overall Record: 33-5
2005 NCAA Champions
NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS RESULTS
SEC Champions
2005 SEC Champions - Katie Heenan was the only Gym Dog at the 2005 SEC Championship to win an event with top honors on the balance beam (9.95) and the all-around (39.625). Heenan also became the first freshman to win the SEC all-around title since Georgia’s Cory Fritzinger won it in 2001. Alabama placed first in all other events, but came in third behind Georgia and LSU.
Georgia's 17 All-America Honors Lead All teams at the NCAA Championships
Gym Dogs Claim Sixth National Title
Georgia head coach Suzanne Yoculan has a history of leading her teams to unexpected heights. In 1987 and '89, Yoculan's Gym Dogs entered the national championships as the fifth seed and came away with victories. But no one could have predicted the "worst to first" jump the Gym Dogs made in 2005 at the NCAA Championships in Auburn, Ala.
Georgia entered the Championships - a 12-team event - as the No. 12 seed. A disastrous meet in the Southeast Regional with a score of 195.15 nearly kept the Gym Dogs out of the competition for the first time since 1983.
There were some tense moments at the regional when Georgia trailed four other teams through two events, but the 2005 Gym Dogs were no strangers to adversity at any time during the year. A four-meet losing streak in midseason is now looked at as a stretch that propelled Georgia to the end of the year. The Gym Dogs opened the season with a win at the Super Six Challenge in Gainesville, Fla., and squeezed out wins in three straight conference dual meets before hitting the four-meet losing skid - the longest in Yoculan's 22 years.
Following the fourth straight loss, which came to Alabama at home on Feb. 18, the Gym Dogs had one of the best regular-season weekends in team history with wins against Utah and UCLA.
It's still a wonder that the string of losses didn't extend to five. In a tight meet at home against the No. 4 Utes, the Gym Dogs looked like their trend of falling off the bars and beam would continue as the first-up on those events hit the mat. But Georgia's last five in the bars lineup finished with solid scores for a 49.2 team total, and on beam the last five competitors found a way to stay on for a 49.025.
Most Georgia fans will probably tell you that Katie Heenan's beam routine that night turned Georgia's season from a subpar year to a regular title contender. Heenan was Georgia's final gymnast of the night on beam and scored a 9.675, nearly falling at the end of her routine. Somehow she stayed on, and drew one of the loudest ovations of the year from the Stegeman Coliseum crowd.
The Gym Dogs ended the regular season by defeating its last five opponents and on March 26 captured the program's 14th SEC championship.
The victory at the SEC Championship was nearly as much a surprise to Georgia followers as the national title. Georgia became the first team in league history to enter the meet seeded fourth and walk away as champion. Heenan won the individual all-around and balance beam titles, including a career-high 9.95 on beam in Georgia's final routine of the night.
Freshman Nikki Childs, senior Michelle Emmons, Sophomore Kelsey Ericksen, and sophomore Ashley Kupets joined Heenan on the All-SEC team.
Victories over several nationally-ranked programs and an SEC Championship would have been enough for most teams that had freshmen compete nearly 50 percent of the routines through out the year and just one senior and junior. After their poor regional performance the Gym Dogs could have folded at nationals and still walked away with a successful season.
Obviously, they were not satisfied. On the first night of the NCAA Championships, Georgia posted the highest score of all 12 teams at 197.35. Childs, Emmons, Ericksen, Heenan, Kupets and Brittany Smith all earned at least one All-America award in the prelim session and Georgia's 17 total All-America honors led all teams. It was the most All-Americans for the Gym Dogs since 1999.
Georgia's 49.225 on balance beam in the prelim session was the second-highest score on that event of the first day, but any score by Georgia would have been an improvement from the three falls the team had on beam at the regional meet. At the rotation draw for the Super Six Finals, Georgia learned it would face its season-long nemesis, the balance beam, in the first rotation of the night. With that event up first for the Gym Dogs, it wouldn't take long to find out if Georgia had a chance at the title.
In the leadoff position, Ericksen posted a 9.85 to get the evening started. Emmons followed with a 9.8 and Smith was right behind in the third spot with another 9.8. Childs scored Georgia's first 9.9 of the Super Six and Kupets was right behind with a 9.85. Heenan ended the rotation with a 9.95, leading to the Gym Dogs' top beam score of the year at 49.35. It was also the highest beam score of the Championships.
Georgia's second event was the floor exercise that ended with a 49.525, the second-highest total of the meet. On vault, the Gym Dogs had another season-high with a 49.575 including 9.95s by Heenan and Smith. In Georgia's final event of the night, Ericksen scored a 9.95 to clinch the meet with a bars total of 49.375.
The Super Six Final was the first meet in Georgia history that no gymnast scored lower than a 9.8 on any event.
Georgia's championship was its first since 1999 and sixth in program history. Yoculan passed the 700 win mark during the year and has an overall record of 706-112-6.
2005 Gym Dog Highs
Vault
- Michelle Emmons 9.950, N.C. State
- < Heenan, Smith 9.95, NCAA Super Six
- TEAM 49.575, NCAA Super Six
- Kelsey Ericksen 9.95, NCAA Super Six
- TEAM 49.375, NCAA Prelim and Super Six
- Katie Heenan 9.95, twice
- TEAM 49.35, NCAA Super Six
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In 22 years as the head coach of the Gym Dogs, Suzanne Yoculan has led the program to six national titles, 14 SEC championships and 17 NCAA Regional titles. She is a three-time NCAA Coach of the Year and six-time SEC Coach of the Year. Under her direction, 50 gymnasts have earned 249 All-America awards and 26 have won NCAA individual titles, more than any other school.
At the Feb. 18 meet against Alabama, the gymnastics team completed a $100,000 pledge to Athens Regional Medical Center for the new Breast Health Center. The pledge honored former Gym Dog Talya Vexler, who is a breast cancer survivor.
