LIACOURAS CENTER TO HOST NCAA MEN’S GYMNASTICS CHAMPIONSHIPS APRIL 11 - 13
Prestigious Event Comes to Temple University Campus - Tickets go on sale Saturday, March 1 at 10 a.m.

PHILADELPHIA, March 26, 2003 – Families of all ages will have the opportunity to catch all the flips, twists and tumbles when the nation’s best collegiate men’s gymnasts compete for NCAA glory during the NCAA Men’s Gymnastics Championships, scheduled to take place at the Liacouras Center from Friday, April 11 through Sunday, April 13.  Tickets for this prestigious event go on sale Saturday, March 1 at 10 a.m. at the Liacouras Center Box Office and all Ticketmaster locations throughout the Delaware Valley.   

The Liacouras Center, a 10,200-seat multi-purpose venue, managed by Global Spectrum, a subsidiary of Comcast-Spectacor, is a full entertainment arena featuring concerts, family shows, Temple Men’s and Women’s Basketball games, and more.  The venue previously hosted the U.S. Gymnastics Championships in August of 2001.   

The NCAA Men’s Gymnastics Championships will feature four separate sessions.  Session One on Friday, April 11 at 1 p.m. and Session Two on Friday, April 11 at 7 p.m. will both serve as Qualifying Rounds for the NCAA Tournament.  Session Three on Saturday, April 12 at 4 p.m. will feature Team and All-Around Finals, as well as Qualifying for the Event Finals.  The exciting action comes to a conclusion during Session Four on Sunday, April 13 at 2 p.m. with the Event Finals.

The NCAA Men’s Gymnastics Championships will include traditional gymnastic disciplines such as still rings, pommel horse, parallel bars, high bar, vault and floor exercise.  Five of the six event titles and the All-Around title will showcase defending champions.  Penn State University is currently ranked number-one in scoring average and won the team title in 2000.

Temple University’s Richie Maguire is the two-time ECAC All-Around champion and has won three other event titles in the ECAC during his career.  Maguire, a member of the United States team that participated in the 2001 Maccabiah Games in Israel, won both floor exercise and horizontal bar at that competition.  He is currently ranked high on both rings and vault in the NCAA.

Temple's co-captain Alex Weber has placed in the top five all three years he has competed.  He holds one event title as well.  A former Junior Olympic pommel horse champion, Weber generally works All-Around for the Owls.

Fred Turoff, who was inducted into the Temple University Hall of Fame in 1984, coaches the Owls.  In a coaching career that has spanned 26 seasons, Turoff, a Philadelphia native, has coached 12 title teams and has a lifetime coaching record of 278-118. 

As a member of Temple’s gymnastics teams from 1966-69, Turoff was the EIGL All-Around and horizontal bar champion in 1968.  He represented the United States at the 1969 Cup of the Americas, the 1969 Maccabiah Games, the 1970 World University Games and the 1970 World Championships.  Turoff was voted NCAA Eastern Region Coach of the Year in 1981, 1985, 1986, 1991, 1998 and for a sixth time in the 2000 season.  His international coaching activities include the World University Games and the Pan American Games in 1991, the Nike International Invitational in 1993 and the Team World Championships in 1994. 

Raj Bhavsar from Ohio State University is the defending All-Around champion and the leader of the Buckeye team that is seeking its second team title in three years.  Bhavsar was a member of the United States Team that placed second in the 2001 World Championships.  Miles Avery serves as the Ohio State Coach.  Avery, originally from North Philadelphia, made the Gymnastics Team at Temple University as a freshman walk-on in 1976, and went on to make the United States National Team in 1982-83.

Daniel Furney from Oklahoma University is a national team member, an All-Around All-American, and is the leader of the defending champion team.  The Sooners, coached by Mark Williams, hope to defend their team title, which they won when they hosted the meet last year.

Cody Moore from the University of California-Berkeley is the defending champion on parallel bars.  He leads the Golden Bears on their quest to improve on their third-place finish in the past two years.  Coached by Temple alumnus Barry Weiner, Cal won team titles in 1997 and 1998. Clay Strother from the University of Minnesota is the two-time defending champion on both floor exercise and pommel horse.  Strother is also a national team member. Marshall Erwin and Dan Gill, from Stanford University, are the defending champions on rings and vault, respectively.

Individual tickets to the NCAA Men’s Gymnastics Championships are $8 per session for Sessions One and Two, and $12 per session for Sessions Three and Four, and go on sale on Saturday, March 1 at 10 a.m. at the Liacouras Center Box Office and all Ticketmaster locations throughout the Delaware Valley.  Tickets can also be charged by phone by calling Ticketmaster at (215) 336-2000, (856) 338-9000 or (302) 984-2000.  All-Session and Group Sales Packages are available by calling 215-389-9543.  An indoor parking garage is attached to the Liacouras Center for patron convenience.

The Liacouras Center (www.liacourascenter.com) is located on the Temple University campus along the Avenue of the Arts in Center City, Philadelphia.  The venue is managed by Global Spectrum, which manages more than 30 public assembly facilities. Global Spectrum (www.global-spectrum.com) is a subsidiary of Comcast-Spectacor (www.comcast-spectacor.com), the Philadelphia-based sports and entertainment firm which owns the First Union Center, the First Union Spectrum, the Philadelphia Flyers, the Philadelphia 76ers, the Philadelphia Phantoms, Flyers Skate Zone, Comcast SportsNet, and the Bowie Baysox, the Delmarva Shorebirds and the Frederick Keys, all affiliates of the Baltimore Orioles.

                                                                                                        ###

Note to Editors: For story angles and photographic images of Philadelphia and its surrounding countryside, visit www.gophila.com/pressroom.     February 2003

Back to News Release List