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Michigan gymnastics wins first ever women’s national title

By Chris Peterson

Apr 17, 2021; Fort Worth, Texas, USA; The University of Michigan Wolverines gymnastics team celebrates winning the 2021 NCAA Women Gymnastics Championship at Dickies Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports
Apr 17, 2021; Fort Worth, Texas, USA; The University of Michigan Wolverines gymnastics team celebrates winning the 2021 NCAA Women Gymnastics Championship at Dickies Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports /
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The Michigan gymnastics team made history on Saturday winning the school’s first-ever national title in women’s gymnastics.

It might not have come in one of the sports that most Michigan fans want, but Wolverines fans can enjoy a national championship today after the women’s Michigan gymnastics team knocked off Oklahoma to win it all.

The Wolverines came into the postseason as the No. 4 team in the country and finished the year with a 29-2 record following a victory over Oklahoma, the defending national champion and top points scorer this season according to 247 sports’ Zach Shaw. 

"“Grinning the day with a dominant floor routine and never looking back, the No. 4 Michigan women’s gymnastics team took down reigning champion and favorite Oklahoma, capturing its first national championship in program history. Michigan captured the title with a score of 198.2500 to Oklahoma’s 198.1625.”"

It’s also notable since its the just the third women’s national championship in school history. The 2005 Michigan softball team also won a national title, as well as the 2001 women’s field hockey team.

The national championship is also the first of any kind at the school since 2014 when the men’s gymnastics team won the national title.

As with just about anything, people turned it into a joke about Jim Harbaugh since he’s never come close to winning a national title.

However, it’s not just the football program that has routinely let Michigan fans down over the years, and actually, between football and hoops, U-M won a football title more recently.

The last championship was back in 1997 for the football team. It hasn’t really come close since outside of 2006 and 2016 when Michigan could have reached the College Football Playoff or the BCS title game with a win over Ohio State.

Yet, the Wolverines lost both of those games, just like the hoops team lost national title games in 1992, 1993, 2013, and 2018. Even the baseball team scored a runner-up finish back in 2019.

It feels like Juwan Howard will have a better chance of bringing home the national title before Harbaugh can. But this day shouldn’t be about that.

It should be a chance to celebrate an incredible team that will go down in Michigan history as one of the best women’s athletic teams the Wolverines have ever had.

With that and the recent Sweet 16 run by the Michigan women’s basketball team and the men’s run to the Elite 8, it’s been a solid spring.

It was heartbreaking to see the hockey team unable to compete in the NCAA Tournament due to COVID-19, but it was really great seeing the women’s team win the gymnastics title Saturday.

And at least for now, who cares if Michigan is a gymnastics school.

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