Over the weekend, William and Mary men’s gymnastics began its postseason slate in Annapolis, Md., as it competed at the USA Gymnastics Collegiate National Championships. The Tribe finished fourth in the meet’s team standings, sent eight gymnasts to the individual event finals and saw four gymnasts take home All-American accolades, with freshman Connor Barrow winning an individual national championship in vault.
Held annually since 1983, the USAG Collegiate Nationals are separate from the National Collegiate Athletic Association National Championships and provide a postseason competition for “military academies and four-year Division I, II or III institutions that sponsor gymnastics as a varsity sport and provide two or fewer full scholarships.” The 2025 field consisted of William and Mary, Simpson College, Springfield College, the U.S. Air Force Academy, the U.S. Military Academy and the U.S. Naval Academy.
Friday, March 28 saw the Tribe take on the individual event preliminaries, the team finals and the all-around finals. Eight of the Tribe’s 12 gymnasts advanced to the individual event finals: Barrow and graduate student Sam Lee on vault, freshman Luke Tully and junior Ricky Pizem on high bar, junior Mark Fu on rings, sophomore Gavin Zborowski on pommel horse, sophomore Niko Greenly and sophomore Evan Wilkins on parallel bars and Wilkins on floor.
Wilkins and Greenly both set career highs on the parallel bars, scoring 13.6 and 13.1 respectively, while Zborowski posted a season-high score of 12.85 on pommel horse.
In the team competition, the Tribe finished fourth with a score of 310.100, putting the team behind Navy (320.700), Army (315.050) and Air Force (313.050) but ahead of Springfield (308.450) and Simpson (300.800). William and Mary’s point total was bolstered by Lee’s third-place vault score and Wilkins’ meet-high floor score and strong parallel bars score.
The all-around event required participants to compete on all six apparatuses: floor, rings, high bar, parallel bars, pommel horse and vault. Tully, the only Tribe gymnast to participate in all-around, finished fourth with a score of 74.700, earning him All-American honors. Impressive showings in vault and high bars propelled him past Springfield sophomore Kaleb Palacio, who scored 74.600, and Simpson freshman Brian Rollison, who scored 74.000.
Saturday, March 29 saw William and Mary compete in the individual event finals. The day was underscored by Barrow, who scored a 14.25 on vault, to sneak past Lee who scored a 14.100, for a national championship victory. The former improved his score by .500 points from the preliminary round, while the latter improved his score by .100 points. Both gymnasts received All-American honors.
Barrow’s victory gave William and Mary its first USAG Collegiate Nationals individual title since former Tribe gymnast Peter Makey ’19 won the rings at the 2018 edition of the meet. The freshman continued his outstanding debut season, which saw him post a program-record-tying vault score of 14.5 during a Feb. 16 meet against Springfield. The performance put him fourth on the national leaderboard for the event and earned him National Specialist of the Week awards from the College Gymnastics Association and the NCAA.
Two other Tribe gymnasts made the podium: Pizem and Tully, who finished second and third on high bar, respectively. Both received All-American honors, marking Tully’s second All-American selection of the meet.
To round out the Green and Gold’s efforts, Fu placed seventh on rings, Zborowski placed seventh on pommel horse, Wilkins placed seventh on floor and Wilkins and Greenly tied for eighth on parallel bars.
The Tribe will continue its postseason Saturday, April 5, when it travels to the Eastern College Athletic Conference Championship hosted by Simpson College at Cowles Fieldhouse in Indianola, Iowa.
