The Oklahoma women’s gymnastics team won their second national title in program history with a score of 197.6750 Saturday night.
Following Oklahoma's men’s gymnastics' 10th national championship earlier Saturday night, Oklahoma became the first school in NCAA history to have both teams win the national title in the same season.
Oklahoma coach K.J. Kindler said the team worked harder for this win than they did for their first national title.
“What do you say?" Kindler said in a press release. "One of the girls this morning, when she woke up, tweeted, ‘It felt like Christmas Eve last night — I couldn’t go to bed anticipating today.' It turns out that’s exactly what it was," she said. "Christmas Day is always a wonderful day when you’re a kid. Today was just an amazing and wonderful day for these ladies and our entire team. They had to fight for it. We learned a lot last year, I think, and they applied it today."
Oklahoma started the night on vault, where sophomore AJ Jackson posted the team-high (9.9) in the anchor spot. Senior Haley Scaman added a score of 9.85, the second highest, to help the team to a 49.225 total on the first rotation.
"Vault was not what we’re capable of, but instead of letting it break ‘em down, they came back stronger and fought on bars, beam and floor all the way to the very end," Kindler said in the release.
The Sooners were on a bye in the second round and moved to bars for the third. Bars have been OU’s strongest rotation all season — a group that Oklahoma coach K.J. Kindler has called the one of the best in program history.
Junior Chayse Capps (9.925), freshman Nicole Lehrmann (9.9) and Scaman (9.9) led the team on bars, pushing OU to a 49.4500 event total and placing them in second behind Alabama.
On beam, Lehrmann (9.9) and sophomore Natalie Brown (9.925) turned in high scores. Capps anchored the Sooners on beam, posting a 9.9375 to end the rotation on a high note. Oklahoma scored a 49.4250 total on the event and moved into first place ahead of Florida.
Oklahoma had another bye in the fifth rotation, moving them to third behind UCLA and Georgia heading into the sixth and final rotation. Brown started off strong for the Sooners on floor, posting a 9.9. Junior Charity Jones and Capps both added scores of 9.9 or higher, as well.
Jackson gave a great performance, and once her score of 9.9125 was announced, the Sooners knew they had secured the national title.
The score was posted just as Scaman was starting her routine — the final routine of her collegiate career. Scaman posted a 9.95 to up OU’s final score before running off the mat to celebrate with her team.
"It was a fight," Kindler said in the release. "The meet was super close. I don’t know if they knew or felt how close it was. We certainly did as coaches and we tried to stay loose and give them the best opportunity to just go free and do what they could do."
The Sooners earned their spot in the finals in the second semifinal session on Friday night with a program-record team total of 197.7875 to take first place. Nine Sooners secured 15 All-America honors on Friday night, the most in program history.
"(I’m) just so proud of them," Kindler said in the release. This is something, obviously, that they’ve wanted, that they’ve worked so hard for. Everyone in that room has worked hard, but this group in particular has a little extra something when it comes to their chemistry that I can’t really describe," Kindler said. "I’ve always believed that chemistry wins championships. They certainly are technically good. They certainly executed well. But, I really feel like that heart and that chemistry is what put them over the top at the end."
