More titles! Sam Mikulak picks up two.
On the same day that the women's tennis team locked up a Big Ten title & softball completed another series sweep, junior gymnast Sam Mikulak added two more titles to his impressive collection, complementing his individual & team all-around championships with event titles in parallel bars and high bar.
For those who may be more informed, I'm wondering if one could start to build a case that Mikulak is the greatest UM gymnast of all time, or at least close to it. He holds two individual all-around titles (and was runner-up the other time), has been on two team title-winning teams, and has (if I count correctly) three individual event titles. This is clearly ridiculous success, does anyone know of someone from Michigan's past who could rival it?
I can't be the only one who misread the word 'Titles' at first.
Yeah I thought it said 'turtles' too.
In addition to his 4!!! NCAA titles this weekend, Sam also earned 6 All-American honors (top 8 in Event finals), from the All-around, then every event except rings. He qualified for the event finals in Rings, and likely would have finished top-8 giving him a clean sweep of All-American honors, but he withdrew from that part of the competiton to avoid injury.
Kid is incredible. He's the first male UM gymnast to ever qualify for the Olympics, so I think that's a pretty good indication he's the best Michigan gymnast ever, though I don't know a lot about the history of that program.
For those curious, Elise Ray competed in the 2000 Olympics before coming to Michigan to compete with the women's gymnastics team 2002-2005.
on the gymnastics front: Though the women's team season ended somewhat disappointingly, short of the NCAA finals, Joanna Sampson and Katie Zurales competed today in event finals today. Sampson took home the NCAA Championship on the Floor Exercise. She also tied for 14th on the vault. Zurales tied for 2nd on the Balance Beam.
...Sampson and Zurales tied with two other gymnasts for 3rd place in the All Around. That makes them both two time NCAA All Americans this year.
April 21st, 2013 at 10:23 PM ^
I came for the tities!
Now, forgive my ignorance on collegiate gymnastics, but will Sam be back next year? Since he's a junior, is there a chance he would forego his senior year?
Regardless------1, 2, 3...we want, mooooooore national championships!!
April 21st, 2013 at 10:59 PM ^
entirely possible that Sam will come back next year and then stick around for another 2 in order to prepare for the 2016 Olympics. In men's gymnastics it's common for guys to train with their college teams in between Olympic quads. He could train elsewhere (Olympic Training Center, etc.) but given his close relationship with coach Kurt Golder, you may just see him around Ann Arbor for a while longer.
This must be what Stanford feels like all the time
April 21st, 2013 at 11:10 PM ^
It was absolutely deserving of the incredibly high score. Left us breathless. Spectacularly high-flying and, as far as I could tell, perfectly executed. Syque Caesar came in second in parallel bars behind Mikulak and third in high bar, and he and Rohan Sebastian tied for fourth in floor. In parallel bars, Adrian de los Angeles added another All-American placement to his 2nd in yesterday's all-around (on a sprained ankle), and Dylan James got his first All-American placement, in pommel horse. As for history: here's the summary from MGoBlue.com:
Junior Sam Mikulak (Corona del Mar, Calif./Corona del Mar) became the first University of Michigan men's gymnast to capture six All-America citations in one championship while sprinkling in a pair of NCAA championships on parallel bars and high bar at the NCAA Event Finals Sunday (April 21) at Penn State's Recreation Hall. As a team, U-M had 11 All-America certificate winners on the day and tied a program record for total championship citations with the 2010 team for the most in program history with 13.
Sam's a junior, but he'll definitely be back next year. Today I sat with the group of maize T-shirts, correctly guessing they were family and friends of the team. Turns out the lady I asked was Sam's mother, a former gymnast herself and a truly lovely lady, and the family invited us to sit with them. Nice to be able to celebrate his highest ever high-bar score with his Mom. You can't imagine how incredible it is to see this level of gymnastics live.
For those of you who haven't, next year the tourney is in Ann Arbor. Everybody should be back but Rohan Sebastian. It's more than worth the [very reasonable] price of the ticket.