The phrase “don’t put all of your eggs in one basket” was coined for a reason.

And it’s a lesson UCLA gymnastics learned last season.

When contending for a national championship, a team must stand out. And the Bruins did – boasting the nation’s No. 1 floor squad.

But the group fell just short of the mark, earning a second-place finish – so close to, yet still too far from, a national title.

The Bruins still outpaced assumptions, bouncing back from a No. 17 finish in 2024 and narrowly making the national final by just over two-tenths.

But once you get into the room, one cannot help but raise expectations.

“I didn’t think second place was going to sting as much as it does, but I think when you are in a competitive sport, getting so close, it does sting,” said coach Janelle McDonald after the National Championship concluded.

[Related: UCLA gymnastics secures runner-up at 2025 nationals for highest finish in 7 years]

But UCLA’s 2026 rendition has all the makings to go the distance – not because of a talent differential, but because of where that talent is spread.

A comparison between the Bruins’ current standing and where they were at this point last season illustrates this.

The two squads sit in similar positions in the national rankings, with this season’s team at No. 4 after six weeks compared to No. 5 at the same point last year.

But the event distributions tell a completely different story.

Last season’s squad may have been a floor powerhouse, but that came at the expense of bars and vault, which held No. 15 and No. 7 rankings, respectively. Floor was UCLA’s highest-scoring event in nine of its 16 meets, and when it was not, it was almost always within hundredths of a point of the team’s top event.

This meant that missing the mark on floor would leave the squad scrambling to make up ground with relatively lower scores on bars and vault rotations. Because the Bruins opened on floor in every NCAA tournament meet last season, a rough start on their signature event had the potential to jeopardize the rest of their competition, widening the margin for error from the get-go.

By contrast, the 2026 squad owns top-five rankings on vault, bars and beam, trading floor dominance for a more balanced showing across the board.

And that balance has already proven effective. UCLA’s current team average sits at 197.404, up from 197.133 at the same point last season. The Bruins have already eclipsed the 198.000 mark – the program’s first 198 achieved in January since 2003.

Event averages have also increased since last season. Beam is up by a tenth, bars has improved by more than two tenths and vault has climbed by another tenth from where the Bruins stood a year ago. That progress has come at the expense of a floor average that sits just under two tenths lower – but this tradeoff reflects a more reliable path to victory.

Yet this does not mean the Bruins have entirely abandoned their floor identity.

After a trio of sub-49.200 performances to open the season, the 2026 group has caught momentum, posting a 49.700 on Jan. 30 against Washington – the second-highest floor score in the nation – which raised them to No. 8 in the national floor rankings.

The surge has been fueled by three perfect 10s from senior Jordan Chiles, but has also been supported by contributions from freshmen Ashlee Sullivan and Tiana Sumanasekera. It is also supported by breakout performances from senior Ciena Alipio and juniors Sydney Barros and Katelyn Rosen – the latter of whom has stepped into the leadoff role.

When UCLA’s 2025 cohort graduated, it left holes across every lineup and raised questions about how the program would recover with such an impactful group graduating.

The Bruins have answered those questions. With depth spread across all four events, UCLA appears more poised than ever to make a deep postseason run.

If there is any time for the Bruins to finish the job, it is now.