Tricia Long to Perform at NCAA Regional Saturday

ECAC Rookie of the Year to Compete in All-Around

04/07/05 11:30AM

Williamsburg - William and Mary freshman gymnast Tricia Long (Humble, TX) will compete in the all-around competition at the 2005 NCAA Southeast Regional Saturday evening at the Stephen C. O’Connell Center on the campus of the University of Florida. Competition is scheduled to get underway at 6 p.m.

Long, the 2005 Eastern Collegiate Athletic Conference Rookie of the Year, will be rotating with the West Virginia University team and will begin her all-around routine on vault in the first rotation. After a bye in the second rotation, Long will move on to bars in the third rotation and beam in the fourth before another bye in the fifth rotation. Long will close the event on floor in the sixth and final rotation.

For more information on the regional and a complete rotation schedule visit the Florida Athletics’ website GaterZone.com, or click on the following link: www.GatorZone.com/gymnastics/tour/ncaa/2005/.

Live scoring from the event will also be available on GatorZone.com by clicking on the Results link on the home regional page (see link above).

Long gained Second Team All-ECAC honors in the all-around competition at the conference championship on March 26th, tying for ninth place with a score of 37.075. In the latest NCAA women’s regional rankings, Long has the second-best qualifying aver-age in the ECAC at 37.500, which ranks 17th overall in the Southeast Region.

While W&M was hit hard with various injuries and illnesses throughout an up-and-down year, Long has been a consistent con-tributor in each event and also has the team’s top RQS on the floor (9.520). As the season wound down, Long came on strong, scoring her top-two all-around scores in the final two meets of the regular season.

On March 9th in a dual-meet with ECAC-rival James Madison, Long compiled a personal-best all-around score of 38.300 to cap-ture the individual title as W&M defeated the Dukes. All four of her marks counted towards the team’s season-high score of 191.750, including a career-high 9.675 on floor. A week later at Penn State, Long notched an all-around score of 38.100 with all four scores again going towards the team total.

She was also awarded the ECAC Coaches Choice Award after an outstanding performance against regional-power North Carolina on January 29th. Scheduled to perform only a floor exhibition, Long stepped into the lineup and nailed her routine to the tune of a 9.650. She added a 9.575 on vault and a 9.050 on beam. Long grabbed weekly honors once again on February 16th, earning rookie of the week accolades after posting a strong all-around score of 38.025 at the Sweetheart Invitational in Raleigh.

Long is the 12th Tribe gymnast to qualify for an NCAA Regional under 11th-year head coach Mary Lewis and just the second freshman ever to do so. The last rookie to compete in a NCAA Regional for W&M was Jamie Weinfeldt in 2001.

The NCAA Southeast Regional Championship is one of the premier meets of the collegiate gymnastics season. Only the top two teams and two all-around competitors (who are not on an advancing team) will advance to the NCAA Gymnastics Championships.

In addition, NCAA Regional individual event winners receive an automatic berth into the NCAA Championships (competing in the event they won), but only if they are not part of a qualifying team or an all-around qualifier. The NCAA Gymnastics Championships will be held April 21-23 in Auburn, Ala.