NCAA Differences Between NCAA and Elite Gymnastics

[ugadawgkat]

I saw on another thread some gymnastic fans recently coming to this site who had not previously been interested in NCAA gym. Got me to thinking of some obvious differences between NCAA and Elite:

NCAA is all about execution, while Elite is much more about difficulty of skills. Roberson is a glaring example of the this. She came in 3rd in the world last year on vault and this past season she rarely made the vault line up at Arkansas.

NCAA is more fan friendly when it comes to understanding scores: The casual fan understands the meaning of a 10 a lot more than a 13.433.

NCAA is a team sport / Elite not so much. Yes Elite gymnasts are competing for their country on a team but it is nothing like the NCAA where it's pretty much all about the team.

NCAA competitions consistently fill up arenas and the following is growing. I've seen very few consistently sold out elite competitions unless you're talking about the Olympics.

 

[BB12]

The team aspect is the largest part. Even at nationals, the individual titles are almost an after thought. It's all about the team title.

 

[Puffin]

NCAA is all about execution, while Elite is much more about difficulty of skills. Roberson is a glaring example of the this. She came in 3rd in the world last year on vault and this past season she rarely made the vault line up at Arkansas.

Although it has to be said that Josc had the luck of her life when

Leanne fell in quals
Anna fell in EF
Deng had a meltdown
and Karina got a 2 point ND for one-arming her Cheng

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

Although it has to be said that Josc had the luck of her life when

Leanne fell in quals
Anna fell in EF
Deng had a meltdown
and Karina got a 2 point ND for one-arming her Cheng

And Rebeca having the year off when she'd initially talked about being back for worlds.

That has got to be one of the most things coming together medals in the history of the sport. Still deserved of course, you can only beat what's in front of you.

 

[ugadawgkat]

The stars aligned for sure for her that day. It just seems crazy that like someone who can perform two elite level vaults albeit not perfectly can’t come up with a good enough yurchenko 1 & 1/2 or just a full. And this shows how different NCAA is from elite. My personal preference will always be NCAA where execution is more important than difficulty.

 

[MaryClare]

The stars aligned for sure for her that day. It just seems crazy that like someone who can perform two elite level vaults albeit not perfectly can’t come up with a good enough yurchenko 1 & 1/2 or just a full. Wasn’t one of her vaults at this competition a double?

She has built in deductions to her pre and post flight. The relative simplicity of the vaults require in ncaa makes no difference