For so many years, Utah’s Greg Marsden, Georgia’s Suzanne Yoculan, Alabama’s Sarah Patterson, UCLA’s Valorie Kondos-Field and a handful of other coaches have been the faces of success in collegiate gymnastics.
They are credited with building the sport into what it is today, a fan-friendly, increasingly popular sport that draws some of the world’s best athletes.
They’ve been around so long, some of the newer programs that have benefitted from their success are now in a position to beat them.
Florida coach Rhonda Faehn (UCLA), Denver’s Melissa Kutcher-Rinehart (Florida), Stanford’s Kristen Smyth (Cal) and Oklahoma’s K.J. Kindler (Iowa State) are all coaches who came from successful programs as athletes and have guided their teams to the 2007 NCAA Championships as coaches.
Faehn, in her fifth year, has the top-ranked Gators positioned to become the first team other than Utah, Alabama, UCLA and Georgia to win the national title since the event was sanctioned by the NCAA in 1982.
Salt Lake Tribune РNCAA GYMNASTICS: Veteran coaches now being challenged by prot̩g̩s
Rhonda Faehn – Gator Zone
Gymnastics Coaching.com 