Freshmen in focus for Auburn gymnastics in San Antonio: See Tigers’ rotation order, potential starters

Two true freshmen scored Auburns best two scores in the Tigers season-opening gymnastics meet last week.

In a way, it wasnt too much of a surprise: Keko Jong and Marissa Neal were the crown jewels of Auburns class of 2024 signing class, both rising near the top-15 of Team USA prospects in their elite careers.

Jong scored 9.900 on bars last week in Auburns opening meet in Nashville, and Neal matched that 9.900 on beam.

Its fitting in another way, too: The freshmen are in many ways in focus for Auburn in these first couple meets of the year.

Of Auburns 24 starts last weekend, eight were made by true freshmen one-third of the Auburns starters competing in the first meet of their college careers.

Another five starts were made by young second-year athletes, redshirt freshmen or sophomores.

Theyll be under the spotlight again Saturday as Auburn enters a five-team meet in San Antonio, the coaching staff once again offering opportunities to new faces and experimenting with different lineups early in the season.

Lot of young people, Auburn head coach Jeff Graba said of last weeks meet.

I think half our lineup was all-new routines.

So thats a lot to get used to.

I think we competed 16 different athletes, which is a lot.

But we did it on purpose.

Well do it again.

Auburn scored a low 195.950 last week, but Graba was sure to point out to the team that Auburn had a similarly low score in Week 1 of the teams run to the Final Four in 2022.

Auburn had an unusually low score on floor, ostensibly an anomaly, and vault seemed to be a battle again but fifth-year senior Olivia Hollingsworth liked what she saw out of the team on bars and beam, saying the team just needed to clean up handstands and landings there.

She also liked what she saw out of the youngsters, many of whom will get another crack at college experience Saturday.

The freshmen this year have a lot of fight, she said.

They want to be in and they want to help contribute to this team, and they did so much work in preseason that it was kind of like Jeff had no option but to put them in because they worked so hard and proved themselves.

So this first meet, obviously we saw they had a little bit of nerves, so as upperclassmen, were just trying to tell them that, Youre going to have nerves every single week, but [its about] just finding your system, figuring out what works for you to help calm the nerves as best you can.

Saturdays meet features five teams: Arizona State, Temple, Penn State, Maryland and Auburn.

The five teams in the meet compete across five rotations with one team off each rotation.

The Tigers will compete in the first four rotations and be on a bye in the fifth, awaiting the final results of the meet.

Most notably, the meet is also on podium the elevated stage on which the apparatus are placed at the SEC Championship meet and in the NCAA Championship meet.

Graba is a big believer in getting his team experience on that podium, experiencing firsthand how sightlines change and how bounce could be different compared to when equipment is placed on a hard basketball court.

The Nashville meet was on podium, and so is Saturdays meet in San Antonio.

The goal for Auburn is to get more podium experience for the roster and more college experience, at all, for the new freshmen.

I think thats really what last week and this week is about, Graba said.

I love the fact that we had to battle last week.

Im frustrated that we didnt do better in a couple of events.

But Id rather see the issues now and be able to fix them, than see them later.

The 2025 Lone Star Collegiate is set for 1 p.m.

at Freeman Coliseum in San Antonio, Texas.

I feel really good about the potential, but I just need to see worth ethic, I need to see focus, I need to see discipline and this teams got that, so I think were in a good spot, Graba said.

These eight gymnasts are scheduled to warm up on each event, Auburn announced Friday night, with six of the eight being named starters before the first rotation: Get local news delivered to your inbox! Sports Editor {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items..

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