Michigan
NCAA Semifinals
Artz, Brown Earn All-America Honors at NCAA Championships
4/15/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Gymnastics
» Junior Nicole Artz earned second team All-America honors on floor.
» Sophomore Brianna Brown claimed second team All-America honors in the all-around.
» Junior Talia Chiarelli performed a rare high-level tucked full in skill on floor.
Site: Fort Worth, Texas (Fort Worth Convention Center)
Event: NCAA Championships
U-M Team Result: No team score
Next U-M Event: Season Complete
FORT WORTH, Texas -- The University of Michigan women's gymnastics team had three individuals competing at the 2016 NCAA Championships on Friday (April 15) at the Fort Worth Convention Center, with junior Nicole Artz and sophomore Brianna Brown receiving second team All-America honors.
In the afternoon session Artz and junior Talia Chiarelli competed, while Brown was in the evening session. Artz, an elementary education and language arts major, finished tied for sixth on floor to give her All-America honors for the third straight season. She has six career All-America honors after adding one this season.
"I had four good routines," said Artz. "I'm happy, it could have gone better, but I'm happy with how it went. I just went out there and tried to have fun today with nothing on the line for me. I felt no pressure and just had fun doing what I love to do."
Brown finished eighth in the all-around during the second session to earn second team All-America honors for the second straight year.
"I just wanted to come out and represent Michigan well," said Brown. "I just tried to go 4-for-4 and was happy I was able to do it."
This is the seventh straight year Michigan has had multiple All-America honorees.
Session I
After a bye in the first rotation, Artz started the day out on bars, an event where she had scored 9.900 or better seven times on the year. She nailed her release move and had solid handstands. Her double layout dismount got big air coming off the high bar, also creating big distance. As she came down she could not quite hold on to the stuck landing, taking a small step forward. Judges gave her a 9.8125.
In her second event, Artz looked brilliant on beam. She put together a clean routine, executing her front aerial to a back handspring with smooth precision and hitting on her rudi dismount she added back in to close her routine. Her efforts earned her a 9.850 and a tie for 13th place in the event.
Right after Artz finished up on beam, her classmate and roommate Chiarelii did her floor routine. Chiarelli threw caution to the wind as an individual performer and added a new third pass to her floor routine, a mammoth tucked full in. An extremely difficult skill, the tucked full in gave her two "E" value passes in her routine as she also led off with a double arabian.
"I worked on it for the two weeks leading up to the meet," said Chiarelli. "It was something I decided to pull out for this meet. There was no team aspect on the line so why not try it."
She could not quite get her landing on the tucked full in but still drew loud cheers from the crowd at the convention center, where eyes were glued to her being the last to compete in the third rotation. She ended up with a 9.7125.
When asked if she would add the tucked full in to her regular routine for next year Chiarelli replied, "Honestly, it is pretty unsustainable, but it was pretty cool to do once."
Artz headed to floor next, which has been a bread and butter event for her all season long. She continued to hit just like she had all day long. She came through with a 9.875 and a loud round of applause from the Michigan cheering section, mixed with claps from the other team's fans.
Closing out the day on vault, Artz posted a score that sounded more like a Boeing Aircraft type than a gymnastics score as the NCAA Championships have six judges per event. Her 9.7875 gave her an all-around total of 39.325 to rank ninth in the session.
Session II
The second session featured Brown competing in the all-around.
"Before I got here, I was really nervous thinking about it being the national championships, but once I got here and saw familiar faces I was good," said Brown.
Brown started things off on her marquee event with bars. She entered the meet with back-to-back 9.950 routines on bars to capture a Big Ten title and take second at NCAA Regionals. Fine tuning the little details in practice helped her make a strong end of the year push. At NCAAs on Friday, she connected on her release move, had good handstands and hit her dismount, culminating in the six judges handing her a 9.800.
Following bars was beam for Brown. She made her front aerial to back handspring beam series look graceful and elegant on her way to a 9.850. After taking her social psychology final exam yesterday she probably could tell that the crowd was very impressed.
Brown got a breather between beam and floor, which worked in her favor as she came out and put together a routine that scored a 9.8125. That made it three straight events with a 9.800 or better.
On vault, Brown put the punctuation on Team 40's season. She had a 9.7875 to finish with an all-around total of 39.25. Her all-around score ranked eighth best in the session to earn her All-America honors.
