The Navy gymnastics team left it all out on the floor of the Crisler Center on Friday night with action in the second session of the qualifying meet as part of the 2025 NCAA Men’s Gymnastics Championship Starting with tough turns on the high bar and floor exercise during their first two rotations, the Mids rallied and performed admirably over the remaining four events to post a score of 308 056 in the competition that was held on the campus of the University of Michigan
Hoping to attain one of the three automatic spots for a team into Saturday’s event finals or at-large bids for individuals of teams that don’t advance, Navy placed sixth in the session and 11th overall in the field of 12 teams The Mids were matched up against No 2 Michigan, No 3 Stanford, No 6 Illinois, No 7 Ohio State and No 11 Army in the second pod
The standings from that session saw those seedings hold fairly true as the three favorites to advance did just that with Michigan placing first with 329 824 points, edging Stanford by 0 796 points (329 028), while Illinois grabbed the final spot with a score of 323 194 Ohio State and Army came in fourth and fifth with respective scores of 319 459 and 311 091
After the gymnasts from Michigan, Stanford and Illinois were advanced from the individual leaderboard, Navy had four Midshipmen qualify for the next round of competition on Saturday night Isaiah Drake (Sr , Los Angeles, Calif ) and Brian Solomon (So , Lynnfield, Mass ) led the way as both advanced as all-arounders They’ll be joined by William Champagne (Sr , Douglas, Mass ) and Matthew Petros (Jr , Broadview Heights, Ohio), who will each be competing in their second career NCAA Championship Finals Drake will conclude his career with a fourth straight day two appearance
As a team, Navy scored 51 231 points on the floor exercise, 51 531 on the pommel horse, 50 832 on the rings, 53 232 on the vault, 52 065 on the parallel bars and 49 165 on the high bar
“I’m really proud of the effort put forth by our guys tonight,” remarked head coach Kip Simons “It’s been a long season with a lot of highs, but tonight certainly wasn’t our night We battled all the way until the end We got off to a rough start on the high bar and floor exercise, but the guys never quit and fought through every last routine They represented Navy Men’s Gymnastics with pride and passion on the national stage ”
The competition on Friday night began on the high bar for Navy The Mids’ four-man lineup had an up-and-down performance with the pair of Petros and Boone Washburn (Fr , Lake Oswego, Ore ) pacing the quartet’s effort Petros earned the second of three at-large advancement spots on the apparatus with a score of 13 133 that ranked 11th overall in the field of 30 as he performed his 4 3-level routine with 8 833 execution Petros was just 0 1 points shy of breaking into the top 10 In his first-ever NCAA Championship Qualifying Meet, Washburn tied for 13th place with a 12 833 score, but was edged for the final advancing spot by Ohio State’s Noah Copeland via tie-breaker Washburn will be on-call as an alternate for tomorrow night’s meet
The Mids’ floor exercise quartet also had a pair of noteworthy efforts with Champagne and Benjamin Thurlow Lam (So , San Francisco, Calif ) both ranking in the top 18 Champagne grabbed the final at-large position for the floor exercise with a 13 566 score courtesy of a 4 6 level of difficulty and 8 966 points of execution to finish 11th overall He was 0 1 points behind Michigan’s Javier Alfonso and Stanford’s Asher Hong Thurlow Lam was 0 2 points back of Champagne in 18th place with a 13 366 mark
Navy’s pommel horse effort was more well-rounded with all four of their gymnasts finishing with scores between 13 133 and 12 466 that occupied four positions between 17th and 26th place on the leaderboard Petros spearheaded the Mids’ lineup with a 13 133 result from 4 7 points via his level of difficulty and 8 433 from his execution Competing without a senior in its lineup, the underclass duo of Daniel Gurevich (So , Frisco, Texas) and Saran Alexander (Fr , Tavares, Fla ) tied for 21st place with matching 12 966 scores
The pair of Aaron Stein (Jr , Houston, Texas) and Drake paced Navy on its next event, the rings For the third time in four rotations, the Mids’ had a gymnast place 11th overall as Stein challenged for the final at-large advancement berth with his score of 13 333 The junior started with a 4 2-degree of difficulty and performed his routine with 9 133 points of execution Stein finished just 0 067 points shy of Jesse Pakele of Ohio State, who earned the third berth at 13 4 Drake was 0 067 points back of Stein and three spots in the standings with a 13 266-point effort In his final collegiate appearance, Sabastian Gordon (Sr , Old Tappen, N J ) scored 12 433 points for his rings routine to finish 25th
Another close trio of performances marked Navy’s vaulting results on Friday night Riley Rose (Sr , Las Vegas, Nev ) put a bow on his collegiate career with an extremely clean final vault that ranked 18th overall Rose posted the second-highest execution score of the session as he garnered 9 466 points for his execution of a 4 1-level vault for a cumulative score of 13 566 Petros and Solomon were separated in the standings by just two spots and 0 066 points at 20th (13 566) and 23rd (13 500), respectively
The Mids’ wrapped up their action at the Crisler Center on the parallel bars with an all-upperclass lineup Senior team captain Vishal Mandava (Cypress, Texas) and Petros tied for 12th place with matching 13 233 scores They both performed their 4 4-level routines with 8 833 efficiency The duo came in just 0 067 points short of qualifying for Saturday’s event finals as Ohio State’s David Ramirez garnered the third spot with a 13 3 result Competing as an all-arounder and not in the team’s four-man counting lineup, Solomon turned in a strong parallel bars routine to net himself 12 966 points to rank 18th overall Drake’s push for a top three result in the all-around competition concluded with 12 866 points on the p-bars on Friday night
Those two final scores by Solomon and Drake did the trick as both gymnasts earned positions in the all-around competition on Saturday night After Illinois’ Preston Ngai and Ian Sandoval advanced via the Fighting Illini’s team score, Solomon challenged Army’s Jaden Blank for a top at-large position as the pair were separated by 0 134 points, though the Black Knight gymnast edged him, 74 698 to 74 564 Drake held off Simpson’s Brian Rollison for the final all-around berth with just 0 366 points splitting the pair, 73 564 to 73 198
The first session of the qualifying meet that was held Friday afternoon saw Nebraska (324 894), Oklahoma (323 460) and Penn State (321 992) advance as teams, while gymnasts from California (319 091), Air Force (313 526) and William & Mary (307 691) secure individual at-large berths in Saturday’s event finals Overall, Navy’s score ranked 11th in the combined team standings
