KALAMAZOO, Mich.- The Western Michigan gymnastics
team
heads to DeKalb, Ill., for the Mid-American Conference
Championships
Saturday, March 24 at 2 p.m. Northern Illinois will serve as this year's host, holding the
event at the NIU Convocation Center. Live stats and video will be available meet.
MEET INFORMATION
Doors open at 12:30 p.m. for the championships, which begins at 2 p.m. in the main bowl of the Convocation Center. The meet will be streamed live at www.NIUHuskies.com and at www.MAC-sports.com and live scoring updates will be available online.
Tickets:
Adults - $10
Youth, Seniors and MAC Students with valid ID - $5
ROTATION ORDER
Unlike traditional dual (two team) or even quadrangular (four team) meets, the MAC Championships will have seven rotations. Four teams compete - one on each apparatus - during every rotation while three teams will be on a bye and sit out that round. The Championship awards ceremony will follow the meet with individual event winners on vault, bars, beam and floor honored along with an all-around champion.
Western Michigan has a bye in the first round Saturday, then begins competition on the uneven bars in the second rotation and then has a bye again in the third rotation. From there, the Broncos go to balance beam in the fourth rotation and heads to the floor exercise in the fifth. WMU has its last bye in the sixth rotation and finishes the meet on vault in the seventh.
CHAMPIONSHIPS SEEDING
Central Michigan (14-6, 6-0), the two-time defending champion and 2012 MAC regular season titlist, is seeded first, followed by Western Michigan (8-7, 4-2) and Kent State (7-4, 4-2). Eastern Michigan (10-9, 2-4), Ball State (4-8, 2-4) and Bowling Green (2-12, 1-5) round out the field.
TITLE TALK
Western Michigan will be chasing its fourth
title in school history and its second MAC Championship in the last seven years. The Broncos' last championship came in 2006. Former Bronco head coach
and current Athletic Director
Kathy Beauregard led WMU to back-to-back titles in
1987 and 1988.
MORE AT STAKE
Not only will the Broncos be competing for the conference crown, but also a chance to extend their season and qualify to the NCAA
Regionals. WMU currently ranks No. 37 in the nation with a regional qualifying score of 194.375. The top 36 teams go on to advance to regionals after the conclusion of the conference meets around the nation. North Carolina sits just above WMU at No. 36 with a RQS of 194.525. Central Michigan is on WMU's heels in 38th, with an RQS of 194.330. The Broncos just missed out qualifying to regionals last year as the No. 37 team. Both Central Michigan and Kent State advanced in 2011 with Kent State qualifying out of its regional for the
national championships.
LOOKING BACK AT THE REGULAR SEASON
Western Michigan
finished the 2012 regular season with an overall record of 8-7 overall,
going 4-2 in MAC duals and finishing second. The Broncos posted three of
the program's all-time top-10 scores, totaling a 195.300 Jan. 29 (ranks
second), a 195.125 Feb.
17 (ranks third) and a 194.575 Jan. 22 (ties for seventh best). WMU has a
season average score of 193.717.
MAC CHAMPIONSHIPS HISTORY
Historically
speaking, Central Michigan and Kent State have been the front-runners in the
conference with 12 and 11 titles, respectively. Western Michigan and Bowling Green tie
for the second
most titles with three apiece, while Ball State and Eastern Michigan
have each won once. Northern Illinois has yet to reach the
top of
the podium. The host team of the championships has had the upper hand in
recent
years. Since 2001 the host school has claimed the team title in seven of
11
years.
LAST YEAR'S CHAMPIONSHIPS
Western Michigan recorded its highest championships score ever at the 2011 MAC meet, totaling a 194.150. The Broncos finished third, the team's highest finish since winning the title in 2006. WMU had six top 10 finishes and was led by freshmen (now the current sophomores) in three out of four events.
Lauren Bledsoe was responsible for two of those, placing sixth on the floor with a 9.825 and 10th on vault with a 9.775.
