March 27, 2006
TEMPE, Ariz.--The No. 11-ranked Arizona State University gymnastics team prepares for the 2006 NCAA North Central Regional Championships to be held Saturday, April 8 at 6:00 p.m. CT at Iowa State University.
Arizona State will make its ninth NCAA Regional appearance in the past 11 years April 8 in the North Central Region at Iowa State University. The meet, which features No. 1 seed Iowa State, No. 2 seed ASU, No. 3 seed Arizona, No. 4 seed Denver, No. 5 seed Minnesota and No. 6 seed Brigham Young, begins at 6 p.m. CT. ASU has defeated Arizona (twice) and Iowa State this year, but lost to Denver. The top two teams at the regional meet advance to the NCAA Championships, April 20-22 in Corvallis, Oregon.
26th-year head coach John Spini has led the Sun Devils to an NCAA regional berth for the ninth time in the last 11 seasons. Spini is currently ASU's longest-tenured head coach, and is tied for second on the all-time Sun Devil head coaching list with long-time track and field mentor Senon "Baldy" Castillo. Former Sun Devil women's tennis coaching legend Anne Pittman holds the distinction as the longest-tenured ASU head coach in school history at 31 seasons. With a fourth-place finish at the 2006 Pacific-10 Conference Championships last Saturday, his regular-season record is now 320-129-2 over 25-plus seasons. His won-loss mark at home is 168-27-1.
Spini was named the 2006 Pacific-10 Conference gymnastics Co-Coach of the Year earlier today along with Stanford's Kristen Smyth, a former Spini assistant.
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