Aleah Finnegan has been named a finalist for the 2025 AAI award honoring the best senior gymnast. She’s up against other top gymnasts including SEC stars Jordan Bowers from Oklahoma and Leanne Wong from Florida. The winner will be announced at the NCAA Championships in April. Teammate Haleigh Bryant
was the recipient of last year’s award. She was the 4th LSU Tiger to receive the honor joining Susan Jackson, current assistant coach Ashleigh Gnat, and Sarah Finnegan, Aleah’s older sister. In last year’s national championship season, Finnegan secured the individual floor title with an impressive score of 9.9625 during the NCAA Semifinals, making her only the fourth gymnast in LSU history to achieve a floor championship. Finnegan has been a consistent presence in every lineup for LSU, competing in the all-around in all but two meets. Throughout the regular season, she has consistently ranked among the top 20 all-around gymnasts in the nation for nine out of 12 weeks. She was the first Tiger this year to achieve a perfect 10, marking only the third perfect score on beam in the country. Her eight career perfect 10s rank as the sixth highest in LSU history, including the second most on floor. So far at LSU, she has claimed 36 titles, with 13 of those earned in 2025. Her 14 floor titles tie for the seventh most in LSU history, a record she shares with her sister, Sarah Finnegan. In 2024, she made history as the first LSU gymnast to represent the Tigers at the Olympics, competing in the qualifying rounds of the Paris Olympics with Team Philippines.
The No. 2 ranked and reigning national champion LSU Tigers will take on the 14th ranked Auburn gymnastics team to wrap up the 2025 regular season tomorrow night.
LSU is competing for a possible SEC regular season title and the top seed in the SEC Gymnastics Championship.
Head coach Jay Clark was asked about how he prepares the team for Auburn which is known for having a hostile environment towards opposing teams. He said, “There are a lot of places that are raucous in our conference and we’ve been to several of them this year. Auburn has a lively environment typically and it’s fun. When you know you’re going into places like that, you should embrace it and have fun with it. Engage with it and enjoy it to the best of your ability. You want to compete in environments that test you. It makes you better and that’s why the conference is as strong as it is.”
Clark went on to talk about the motivation the team has for tomorrow’s meet and how the most important thing is to leave Auburn with a W. He said, “We want to win the meet…I think our team’s done a good job of answering whatever we’ve requested from them as we’ve gone [along]…I think for the most part we’ve done a good job since Arkansas of being measured in that way and understanding that now we’re in a place where we’re really just trying to get some fine details. Because the better you get, the harder it is to improve.”
The meet is scheduled to air on SEC Network+ and will begin at 7:00 p.m. CT on March 14th from Neville Arena in Auburn, Alabama.
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