Fe 18, 2016
- Read the February issue of Hawk Talk Monthly
- 2016 Media Guide
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- Big Ten Network: Free Hawkeye Video
- 24 Hawkeyes to Watch
THIS WEEK:
The No. 7-ranked University of Iowa men’s gymnastics team will send seniors Jack Boyle, Matt Loochtan along with junior Andrew Botto to Las Vegas, Nevada, for the annual Winter Cup Challenge. The competition serves as the first step in selecting a team to represent the United States at the 2016 Olympics in Rio.
The competition will run from February 18-20 inside the Cashman Convention Center with prelims beginning on Feb. 18. Session 1 begins at 3 p.m. (CT). followed by session 2 at 8:30 p.m. (CT). Finals will take place on Feb. 20 at 9:15 p.m. (CT).
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FOLLOW ALONG:
Results for the competition can be found at wintercup.com and the team’s schedule page at hawkeyesports.com. Photos and videos from the meet will be posted on the competition’s website during the meet and live stats can be found at hawkeyesports.com
LAST TIME OUT:
The Hawkeyes competed in Minneapolis, Minnesota, with Stanford, Illinois and Minnesota. Iowa placed fourth with a team score of 419.700. Senior Matt Loochtan placed second overall on floor with a 15.000 and junior Andrew Botto tied for third on rings, posting a score of 14.750. Junior David Spanier set a career high on vault with a 14.800.
BOYLE TOP-RANKED GYMNAST ON HIGH BAR:
Senior Jack Boyle is atop the national leaderboard on high bar this season. As a team, the Hawkeyes rank fifth nationally on high bar with a 3 score average score of 72.117. The Naperville, Illinois, native is ranked first in the country on high bar with a 3 score average score of 15.233 through five meets. Boyle’s high score of 15.300 came against Illinois on Jan. 23. He leads Stanford’s Robert Neff by .100.
2015 WINTER CUP:
In 2015, the Hawkeyes sent Jack Boyle and Matt Loochtan to the Winter Cup. In prelims, Boyle placed 19th overall with an all-around score of 79.250. Loochtan placed 30th with an all-around score of 56.750 while competing on four events. Loochtan was the lone Hawkeye to qualify for finals. Loochtan tied for fourth overall on vault with a combined score of 30.050 and eighth on floor with a 29.350.
Cory Paterson COMPETES IN CANADA:
During the Hawkeyes off-week on Feb. 6, junior Cory Paterson traveled to Halifax, Nova Scotia, with assistant coach Ben Ketelsen for the 2016 Elite Canada Artistic Gymnastics Championships. Paterson placed seventh overall in the all-around competition with a 79.100 and third on high bar with a 13.600 effort.
HIGH SCORING HAWKS:
Iowa made history in back-to-back meets on Jan. 23-24. The Hawkeyes have never scored above a 430.000 team score in January in the program’s history, but in 2016, the team did it twice with a 430.850 coming against Illinois on Saturday and a 431.150 the next day against UIC.
BIG TEN SHOWS POWER:
The Big Ten Conference has been dominant so far this season. Of the top ten teams listed on roadtonationals.com, seven are from the Big Ten, including: No. 3 Ohio State No. 4 Minnesota, No. 5 Illinois, No. 6 Nebraska, No. 7 Iowa, No. 8 Penn State and No. 10 Michigan.
HAWKEYES SIGN 3 FOR 2016-17:
The Iowa men’s gymnastics team signed three standout gymnasts for the 2016-17 season. Andrew Herrador (Sunnyvale, California), Nicholas Merryman (Brookline, New Hampshire) and Mitch Mandozzi (Harvard, Massachusetts) signed National Letters of Intent to continue their gymnastics career at Iowa. The recruiting class has combined for nine state championships and five national championships.
ROSTER BREAKDOWN:
The 2016 men’s gymnastics team breaks down in to four freshmen, three sophomores, five juniors and six seniors.
HAWKEYE NEWCOMERS:
The Hawkeyes welcomed four freshmen to the team for 2016: Todd Beyer II, Jake Brodarzon, Kevin Johnson, and Rogelio Vazquez.
- Beyer, a 2015 Iowa state champion in all-around, also competed at JO nationals in 2015, placing first on high bar, second on floor, and third on vault.
- Brodarzon is a 2014 national champion on vault and was also crowned the 2015 state champion on floor, rings, vault, high bar, all-around in his home state of New Jersey.
- Johnson competed at the 2015 Michigan state championships placing first on pommel horse and second on rings. He also competed at JO Nationals this past year.
- Vazquez, a back-to-back state Florida champion on rings and all-around, is a six-time JO National Championship qualifier (2009-15). He is also a regional champion on rings, parallel bars, and all-around.
2 NAMED GYMNASTS TO WATCH:
Junior Andrew Botto and senior Matt Loochtan were both named to the Big Ten Men’s Gymnasts to Watch List, announced by the conference on Dec. 10. It is Botto’s first appearance on the list, while Loochtan earns the honor for the second consecutive season.
Loochtan, a 2014 All-American on rings, set a career best on vault in 2015 with a 15.150 at the Winter Cup in Las Vegas. Loochtan also set season highs with a 15.200 on rings in a March 15 meet against Nebraska and a 14.850 on parallel bars at the Big Ten Championships on March 27.
Botto, a Redwood City, California, native set new career bests on rings and vault last season. He scored a 15.050 on rings for second place in a win against Minnesota and Nebraska on Feb. 14 and set another career high a month later with a 15.100 on vault, tying for first. Botto was also named an academic All-Big Ten honoree.
HEAD COACH JD Reive:
JD Reive, the seventh head coach at Iowa, is entering his sixth year at the helm of the program. Reive is looking for continued success following a sixth place finish at the NCAA Championships last year. Reive has led an all-american in each of the past three seasons and has one of the highest team GPA’s at Iowa with eight gymnasts named to the 2015 Big Ten Winter Academic All-Conference team.
In 2015, Iowa sent five gymnasts to compete in the event finals of the Big Ten Championship. Doug Sullivan was named all-conference on pommel horse following a score of 14.800. As a team, Iowa placed sixth with a team score of 427.600. At the NCAA event finals, Jack Boyle was named an all-american on high bar with a sixth place finish and a score of 14.850.
Reive graduated from Nebraska in 2000 with a bachelor of journalism degree and was an assistant at Stanford from 2003-10 where he helped the team grab four top three finishes. Reive was also named Collegiate Gymnastics Association Assistant Coach of the Year three times (2006, 2009 and 2010) and was also the National Assistant Coach of the Year in 2009.
