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Stanford senior Sho Nakamori came up huge in his final home men's gymnastics meet Saturday. He won four individual titles and the top-ranked Cardinal won the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation title at Maples Pavilion.

Nakamori was names MPSF Gymnast of the Year as Stanford, with a score of 363.750, won its first MPSF title since 1995, also the same year the Cardinal last won the NCAA title. Oklahoma was second with a score of 358.350.

"We just got together before the meet and talked about performing and being aggressive," Nakamori said. "We had nothing to lose and we knew we had to go big to able to win."

Stanford competes at the NCAA Championships April 16-18 in Minneapolis.

The Cardinal opened with a season-best 64.100 on vault, and sophomore Josh Dixon became the third Stanford gymnast to hit 16.400 on the apparatus, joining Stanford grad David Sender and sophomore Tim Gentry. Dixon took second place in the event. Sophomore Alex Buscaglia and Nakamori also nailed career-bests, 16.050 and 15.550 respectively.

Redshirt junior Greg Ter-Zakhariants tied his own career high of 14.6 on parallel bars as the Cardinal went on to score 58.500 to keep the overall team lead after two rotations. Nakamori won the event with a 15.400.

On horizontal bar, the Cardinal swept the top three spots. Nakamori shared the event title with sophomore Alex Buscaglia with an even 15.000. Dixon took third with a 14.850.

Stanford was spectacular on floor exercise, scoring a meet high 61.800. The nation's top tumbler, Dixon, nailed a career-best 15.9 to take the event title. His score is also an all-time team best.

The Cardinal also handled the pommel horse, as Dixon (14.050) and Ter-Zakharaints (14.750) scored career-highs, while Nakamori improved upon his own personal best as well as the team's season-best with a 15.250 to win the event.

Stanford clinched the team title with its best still rings score of the season (61.500) to as sophomore Ryan Lieberman (14.650) and Nakamori (15.200) turned in personal season-highs, while redshirt sophomore Nick Noone (15.200), sophomore Kyle Oi (15.150), and Gentry (15.450) landed career-bests. Hadden won the event with his personal and the team's season best of 15.650.

"Everything is coming together," said Stanford coach Thom Glielmi, who was named MPSF Coach of the Year. "There is still room for improvement, as we had some guys miss routines we would normally want to count, but we have good enough guys to back them up and cover them so we can still post pretty solid scores. As far as the guys, they just have been working so hard. It's just coming together and that's the way it should be."

Women's gymnastics
Nicole Ourada and Allyse Ishino each shared a co-title and fourth-ranked Stanford finished second to host Arkansas, 196.30-196.20, in the NCAA South Central Regional to earn a berth at the NCAA Championships in Lincoln, Neb. April 16-18.
Ourada scored a 9.875 to share the vault title while Ishino scored 9.900 on the bars to share the regional title.

Junior Carly Janiga led the Cardinal with an all-around score of 39.425.

-- PA Weekly Online Sports