April 4, 2004
April 4, 2004 - On the third and final day of competition at the NCAA Men's Gymnastics Championships, Dan Gill and Peter Derman represented Stanford on five events. Dan competed on floor exercise, pommel horse, vault, and horizontal bar, and Peter competed on the still rings. In NCAA event finals, only the top six places earn All-American awards, and both Dan and Peter managed to earn this distinction on all the events they competed on.
In his final NCAA competition, Dan Gill was in the top six places on all four of his individual events. On floor exercise, he scored a 9.312 and tied for 6th. On pommel horse, he earned a 9.687, which put him in 2nd. On vault, his mark was a 9.425 and he received 5th place. In his final event, the horizontal bar, he scored an incredible 9.737, but he was edged out of first by a mere 0.038 points by sophomore Justin Spring from Illinois. This performance earned Dan four more All-American titles in addition to the all-around award he won on Saturday. This was a great season and NCAA championships for Dan Gill.
The only other Cardinal to compete today was freshman Peter Derman. It is notoriously difficult for any underclassman to break into the upper ranks of NCAA competition against the more experienced juniors and seniors. However, Peter performed and extremely difficult strength sequence on still rings and scored a 9.562, which put him in 4th place. Because he was in the top six, Peter will be a 2004 All-American on this event. Congratulations on a job well done!
This competition concludes the 2003-2004 Stanford men's gymnastics season. Although Dan Gill will be continuing on towards his Olympic dreams and graduating from Stanford, there is a fresh batch of recruits coming next year, and the returning six freshmen will add experience to their talent. It should be another great year for Cardinal gymnastics.