The 5th-seeded Colonials will compete against No. 3 LSU (No. 1 seed), No. 10 Georgia (No. 2), No. 15 Oregon State (No. 3), Arizona (No. 4) and Michigan State (No. 6). The other regionals are: Tuscaloosa, Ala., Athens, Ga., Salt Lake City, Utah, Minneapolis, Minn and Iowa City, Iowa. You can’t walk in your first year and say, ‘Let’s win a national title.’ That wouldn’t be a realistic goal.
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“The collective body of work that we’ve had this season has been very consistent and very strong”, Howell said.
The Huskers finished second at last year’s NCAA Ames Regional with a score of 196.950 to qualify for the NCAA Championships, where they finished eighth. Each regional site will feature six teams, four all-around competitors who are not part of teams who qualified for regional competition and two individual event specialists for each event who met the minimum Regional Qualifying Score (RQS), all vying for spots at the Championships.
“This is something that we’ve been working hard toward for the last five years – being in a position where we can go into a regional as one of the top seeds, and have a really strong opportunity to continue to advance in the postseason”, Howell added. “We’ve been doing that and that’s going to help continue our success”.
The top two scoring teams from each region will move onto the national championships April 15-16 in Fort Worth, Texas.
“I don’t really know what it’s like to not go to regionals because I’ve only been here since we have been going”, McIntire said.
With a current Regional Qualifying Score (RQS) of 196.155 and a season average of 195.752, the team will try to qualify for their first national championship appearance since 2002. “This is our first day of being a leader of the pack and we need to handle it well”. Utah State finished third on vault (48.925), third on bars (49.025), third on beam (49.000) and fourth on floor (48.925).
It is the 33rd consecutive season the Cardinal has advanced to the NCAA regional competition. The biggest thing about being a top seed for us is that it gives our team a good rotation.
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