Anna Barbosu's NCAA Debut, Florida on Top, and LSU's Tiebreaker Explained

GymCastic: The Gymnastics Podcast

Sports

4.7 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 13 January 2026

⏱️ 63 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Why did LSU lose the tiebreaker — and what does it reveal about NCAA gymnastics scoring? The judging decisions behind LSU vs. Oklahoma, explain how tiebreakers actually work, and analyze Florida's rise to #1 after the first full week of competition. We also cover Anna Barbosu's historic NCAA debut, notable scores and trends across the country, and why GymCastic is leaving Twitter/X.

HEADLINES

LSU gave an explanation of their tie breaker loss from the floor that doesn't match Virtus.

GYMTERNET NEWS

What happened at the Sprouts Quad meet? Aka January Nationals. We discuss what happened between Oklahoma, LSU, UCLA, and Utah
Which team is topping the charts this week?
Florida spotlight
- Kayla DiCello competed for the first time since 2024 Olympic Trials
- Skye Blakely competed floor for the first time since 2024 National Championships
- Should this team be able to win nationals?
  - What does this team need to do different this time around to make a national title happen?
- Spotlight: The Show
  - Why Florida is winning the marketing game with its documentary/commercial show
This week's 10.0 club is brought to you by Avery Neff's gorgina Yurchenko 1.5
This week's 9.975 club:
- Vault: Paige Zancan, Hannah Horton, Ashley Glynn
- Bars: Azaraya Ra-Akbar
- Beam: Selena Harris
- Floor: Cecilia Cooley
Our favorite moments of the week
- Cadence Gormley (Kentucky) went full ninja-mode on beam and saved her front aerial
- UC Davis has a humongous stick hat and we're here for it
- Ana Barbosu has a part in her floor routine where she stabs herself in the stomach three times and uses the blood as lipstick before she throws it into a ravine. Do we think this is social commentary on the state of the Romanian federation?

FEEDBACK

What was going on with the commentary at the Florida meet?
Score tower clarification question
We need Spencer to be our beacon of light for the 2026 season
University of Washington parking nightmare follow up
Could Al Fong continue coaching in the United States?
Why we are leaving Twitter

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Chapters

00:00 – Headlines: LSU Loses the Tiebreaker + Anna Barbosu NCAA Debut

00:29 – Sprouts Quad "January Nationals" + How the Tie Happened

01:29 – Lexi Zeiss Beam Score Controversy (Start Value Mess)

06:32 – The Tiebreak Explained: Why Oklahoma Wins

08:50 – College & Cocktails Promo: "Angry Beam" + Weekly Shows

11:23 – Gymternet News: Romania Hires Nikolai Forminte (Again)

13:01 – Chow's Gym Lawsuits + SafeSport Named in Suit

14:00 – Adult Gymnastics Book: Broken to Unbreakable

15:02 – NCAA Week Recap: Utah Beam Disaster + Rankings

18:45 – Florida #1: Kayla DiCello Returns + Skye Blakely Adds Events

25:12 – Jenny Rowland's Silver Pants + Coaches Blocking Judges on Bars

27:20 – Florida "Documentary" = 15-Minute Sponsored Ad (Wells Fargo Vibes)

33:30 – Week's Big Scores: 10.0 + 9.975s Breakdown

40:08 – Vault Trend Watch: More Yurchenko Double Fulls

42:01 – Favorite Things: Cadence Gormley's 6-Second Beam Save

43:22 – Stick Crowns + UC Davis Giant Hat Comedy

45:01 – Anna Barbosu Debuts at Denver + "Stomach Stab Lipstick" Choreo

50:23 – Scary Vault: No Hands Contact… Why Wasn't It a Zero?

53:31 – Listener Feedback: Florida Commentary Was Brutal

55:51 – Scoreboard "Tower" Question: Why Scores Change On Screen

57:14 – GIFs of the Week Pressure Campaign + Parking Trauma Follow-Up

58:53 – Can Al Fong Switch Federations and Keep Coaching?

01:00:15 – GymCastic Leaving Twitter/X (Why We're Done)

01:02:43 – Where to Find Us Now + This Week's Schedule

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Today, LSU lost a tiebreaker and Jay Clark gave an explanation and we're going to discuss that.
0:07.9	Olympic floor medalist Anna Barbosu made her NCAA debut.
0:12.2	I'm going to talk about all the Jimternet news and NCAA news and answer a few of your questions.
0:16.9	Today is January 13th, 2026.
0:20.1	And welcome to the number one gymnastics podcast in the Galaxy.
0:23.3	I'm Jessica, and here with Spencer from the balance beam situation.
0:27.4	Let's begin with the headlines.
0:29.9	Sure.
0:30.8	It's a good place to start.
0:32.2	Yeah, so there was the Sprouts, Sproutsness.
0:35.6	The Sprouts, the college meet where like good teams go get
0:39.2	together and have a meet and then sprouts is like we're the
0:41.6	sponsor you know so it's the sprouts quad it is a podium
0:45.3	meat which we call January nationals and last year Oklahoma won
0:49.1	and this year they won again by tiebreaker and then they won
0:52.5	NCAA so of course if history holds okay so that's what this is just, this is nationals. Yeah. Did they wear like a white Leo with, like, what are your other curses that have to happen? That tie-dye one didn't even curse them. So they're uncursable. So Oklahoma is uncursable. Yeah. But what about your head coach curse? They couldn't replace KJ and win, right? No, if they replaced KJ. Forever, yeah. Right, that would, they will never win again. This is the rule because that still hasn't been broken. But, so let's talk about LSU, why they lost the tiebreaker and what happened with Lexi, Lexi Zice's routine.
1:30.0	Yes.
1:30.9	It delivered, this meet delivered the drama we were looking for for, you know, basically pointless January competition because we had to have a, there was a trophy that we had to award.
1:39.9	So we had to figure out who you got those trophies with the spinning part in the middle.
1:43.9	So it's a good one because it moves.
1:46.3	So it's like already top 10% trophy.
1:49.1	So basically, the meet was ending.
	...

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