Massive crowd watch Roberson’s strength, Price’s energy generate improbable comeback at Bud Walton
Arkansas Razorbacks gymnast Frankie Price locks down the upset with a 9.950 on the floor against the defending national champion LSU Tigers at Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville, Ark.
Arkansas Razorbacks gymnast Frankie Price locks down the upset with a 9.950 on the floor against the defending national champion LSU Tigers at Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville, Ark. / Ted McClenning-Hogs on SI
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In the world of gymnastics, it’s the little things that really matter.
Jocelyn Roberson is most well known for her spot as a 2024 U.S. Olympic team alternate. However, with a packed Bud Walton Arena full of Razorbacks fans going wild, the true freshman came up with the biggest moment of her young career.
With Arkansas needing every possible hundredth of a point to keep within seeing distance of reigning national champion LSU, Roberson tightened the muscles in her hip and squeezed as hard as possible onto the beam with her toes to hold onto what should have definitely been a fall. After muscling her way out of disaster on one leg, then following with a Hog call from the end of the beam, the comeback was on.
It was still a deduction, but not enough to stop the energy that ripped through the crowd and team in the final third of the meet. All No. 2 LSU and coach Jay Clark could do was watch as the Razorbacks stormed back while the pressure of facing such an intense road environment drug on a typically unshakable championship line-up, resulting in a 196.875-196.600 upset.
Arkansas freshman Jocelyn Roberson leads the celebration with fans after the Razorbacks knocked off No. 2 LSU.
Arkansas freshman Jocelyn Roberson leads the celebration with fans after the Razorbacks knocked off No. 2 LSU Tigers at Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville, Ark. / Ted McClenning-Hogs on SI Images
“This is a great atmosphere in here,” LSU coach Jay Clark said after the first two rotations. “I love that Arkansas has put this thing in this arena. This is where it ought to be. It’s just a fantasitc environment. It’s our first road test in an environment like this. I think our kids are competing extremely well. It’s wonderful. It’s loud. It’s crazy. It feels a little bit like home. We’ve got to up our game a little bit when we get back home I guess.”
In the end, everything came down to Konnor McClain, Aleah Finnegan and Haleigh Bryant on LSU’s side and Roberson, Leah Smith and Frankie Price for Arkansas. It might not be possible to put together a stronger line-up of six college gymnasts from only two teams to face off for it all.
The Tigers began showing focus issues on floor in the third rotation, which carried over onto beam as things got crazier and crazier in Bud Walton. After numerous wobbles, McClain posted a 9.575, meaning LSU would have to count a 9.600 by Lexi Zeiss, opening the door wide for Arkansas to potentially seize the win.
Bryant posted a 9.800 that raised some eyebrows, but in the end, the controversial 9.700 issued by one judge didn’t matter. That’s because Roberson and Smith nailed back-to-back 9.925 scores on a night where anything out of the 9.800 range was borderline impossible with the judges.
Finnegan posted a 9.925 as the Tigers’ last gasp to make things interesting, but the second Price’s traditional hip-hop music for floor leaning heavily into multiple Snoop Dogg tracks, it was more of a massive celebration rather than a moment to worry whether Arkansas was going to win.
The crowd rumbled as one judge flashed a 10.000. By the time the official score of 9.950 came up, the celebration was already well underway.
“The atmosphere was, oh my gosh, it was incredible,” Arkansas coach Jordyn Wieber said. “I mean, it was loud in there. The people showed up students. I mean, we had a record number of students for the first time ever. So it was just so much fun. I think the fans continue to see the passion and the joy that these athletes bring to the stuff that they’re doing. They’re not only doing hard gymnastics, but they’re doing it with such joy, and I think that people are really attracted to that, and they want to come back and they want to cheer on this team. So I’m looking forward to three more amazing meets in Bud Walton this year.”
The win kicks off what is literally the toughest two-meet stretch in all of college gymnastics. Arkansas has to travel to No. 1 Oklahoma next week.
While the score is a bit less than Wieber would like in terms of the Razorbacks’ potential national qualifying score, it was a big deal to pull off such a big win in front of such a large home crowd. For the team in this particular season, it would have been more advantageous to lose 198.025-197.625.
That would have meant a big jump in the overall college rankings and been a huge boost to the final national qualifer total. However, with Bud Walton potentially filled with a lot of newcomers to the sport who process a win over the nation’s No. 2 ranked team way better that formulas that determine who gets to compete in the postseason using a collection of specific average scores instead of wins and losses, it was big for the overall future health and growth of the program to send everyone home on the high of Price’s final performance.
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