Incoming gymnast garners top honors

Gymnast Alicia Sacramone, who signed a letter of intent with
UCLA for the 2007 season, won the gold medal on floor exercise at
the 2005 World Gymnastics Championships in Melbourne, Australia.
Sacramone, who also took home a bronze medal on vault, pulled off
an Arabian double front opening pass and a triple twist final pass
en route to the gold. “I’m ecstatic,” Sacramone
said. “I didn’t have any expectations. I just came here
to do my best, and it happened. I just tried to make my passes
consistent, make clean jumps and just do the best that I
could.” Sacramone, who is considered to be one of the best
vault and floor competitors in the world, hails from Winchester
High School (Winchester, Mass.) and her latest feat stands out
among an impressive list of career accomplishments. She won the
vault and floor titles earlier this year at the World Cup meet in
Belgium, by defeating the Olympic champion Catalina Ponor (Romania)
in the floor event. In addition, Sacramone won double gold at the
Pan American Gymnastics Championships in Brazil and took home first
place in the vault event at the American Cup. Last year, she
defeated the reigning Olympic champion Monica Rosu of Romania to
win the vault gold medal at the World Cup Final. On vault at the
championships, Sacramone had a two-score average of 9.412.
China’s Cheng Fei won the gold with an average of 9.656 while
thirty-year-old Oksana Chusovitina of Uzbekistan barely defeated
Sacramone to win the silver medal with a score of 9.418. The U.S.
women came home from the World Championships with nine medals,
including the gold in the bars, beam and floor. When Sacramone
joins the Bruin gymnastics team for the 2007 season, she will
become the first individual world gold medalist to join the UCLA
gymnastics team. Sophomore Tasha Schwikert took home the team gold
in 2003.

GOLF TEAMS GATHER HONORS: Golf World Magazine
rewarded the UCLA men’s and women’s golf programs with
a variety of awards last Wednesday. Freshman Erik Flores, who comes
to UCLA from Grass Valley (Nevada Union High School) was named to
the mid-season All-Freshmen team and is ranked 17th nationally.
Flores has notched three top-ten finishes for the Bruins and his
71.2 average score leads the team. Sophomore Daniel Im is ranked
20th nationally and was honored as a mid-season All-American. Im
placed in the Top 10 at all three tournaments that he played in. In
women’s golf, freshmen Jane Park and Tiffany Joh were also
honored by being named to the mid-season All-Freshmen team. Joh is
ranked 12th nationally and leads the Bruins with a 71.7 scoring
average; Park averaged 72.0 and is ranked 5th in the nation. At the
end of the fall season, the women were ranked second while the men
finished as the No. 6 team in the nation.

WATER POLO BRACKET ANNOUNCED: The four-team
national championship bracket for men’s water polo was
announced Sunday, without defending national champion UCLA. The USC
Trojans earned the No. 1 seed after capturing the Mountain Pacific
Sports Federation title over Stanford with an 8-5 showing. Although
the Cardinal lost, they received the at-large bid which is usually
given to the team placing second in the MPSF tournament. The
Cardinal will open up the tournament with a game against Loyola
Marymount who earned their bid by capturing the Western Water Polo
Association title with a narrow 7-6 victory over the UCSD Tritons.
Although they are making an appearance in the tournament, the Lions
have struggled to capture victories over the top teams from the
MPSF, going 0-11 against them. Two of those teams, USC and
Stanford, will also be taking part in the NCAA Tournament. The
fourth and final team in the tournament is the only team from
outside the state of California ““ St. Francis of New York.
St. Francis will face the Trojans, who have lost just once this
season, in the first round of tournament play. The Bruins failed to
make it to the NCAA Tournament just one year after capturing the
national title with a win over Stanford. UCLA lost in the first
round of the MPSF tournament to the Cal Bears 13-12.

NCAA MEN’S SOCCER COLLEGE CUP: The SMU
Mustangs, who defeated UCLA 3-0 last week at Drake Stadium,
advanced past the third round to take on North Carolina in the
round of eight. The Mustangs were the first team to score at Drake
Stadium and ended the Bruins’ season and hopes for a title
run. The Bruins’ Pac-10 counterpart, Cal Bears, also advanced
to the third round of the NCAA tournament.

Compiled by Bruin Sports Senior Staff.