The No. 17 Cyclones’ plan to  head to Los Angeles Saturday in order to compete in one of the six NCAA Regional Competitions. They will go up against No. 3 UCLA, No. 9 Arkansas, No. 21 Arizona, BYU and Arizona State. 

The gymnasts are coming off a last-place finish at the Big 12 Conference Championship, where they let the competitive atmosphere cause them to make mistakes.

“I think at Big 12’s we kind of let a little bit of doubt get into our minds,” said senior Ceilia Maccani. “So we’ve really been working on being confident on every single routine and every single turn that we do and really kind of showing that off and having a presence. This week we’ve really been working on confidence.” 

Since the Big 12 competition, the Cyclones have not only been working on confidence in practice but also working on dealing with extra adrenaline so that the more intense competition of regionals doesn’t distract them. The team tries to stay focused on its own routines instead of the competition. 

“Each person kind of has their own thing that they do but we just try and get in the zone,” Maccani said. “If we can tell that someone is kind of straying we all come in as group and talk to each other and stay within each other instead of focusing on what everyone else is doing. We try to focus on us and nobody else.”

Senior Anna Robey said the coaching staff has been telling the gymnasts to practice being aware of the competitive atmosphere and then completely forgetting it so that they can do their job and forget the jitters. 

“I think we’ve trained ourselves to not let the whole environment take over,” Robey said. “Being a consistent competitor on floor this season you get all that adrenaline and you go out there and use it with the crowd. It can make you perform better but you still have to focus on you and focus on your job and pretend like it’s only you and your equipment out there.”

The gymnasts are hoping that the hard work in practice will pay off so that they have a better experience than their less confident performances at the Big 12’s. 

“[After Big 12’s] I think we kind of got more hungry,” Robey said. “We want to do even better when we go to regionals and so I think we are going to go out there and focus even more.”

If the Cyclones are able focus, Maccani said the team is capable of having a strong meet and hitting routines. If the team does this Maccani says it could easily place in the top two. 

Out of the six teams that will compete in the regional, the only team the Cyclones have previously faced this season is BYU, who lost to Iowa State 195.625–192.050. The top two teams at the regional competition will continue on to the NCAA Championships.

If the Cyclones make it to the National Championships, Maccani said they will be very excited, but she said whether or not they make it the team is still happy with the season. 

“Our season has been overall really good,” Maccani said. “We’ve been moving up in rankings a lot and this is the highest ranked we’ve been in years so overall we’re really really proud of what we’ve done.”

The Cyclones will compete in the NCAA West Regional Competition 8 p.m. Saturday.