Feb. 1, 2008

The Temple men's gymnastics team (4-1) will see action on their home turf of McGonigle Hall as they take on three-time Big Ten champion Ohio State (#7) and conference rival Navy (#11) in a tri-meet scheduled for a 7:00pm start on Saturday.

The competition also marks the homecoming of former Temple Owl and current Ohio State coach, Miles Avery. A former student-athlete of Temple head coach Fred Turoff, Avery is also the coach of 2004 Olympic All-Around Champion, Paul Hamm.

Currently ranked #9 in the nation and first in the ECAC conference, the Owls will look to the senior leadership of Sterling Kramer and Luke Vexler to put the squad back on track. Last week, the Cherry and White suffered their first loss of the season to defending NCAA champion Penn State. While the Owls weren't expected to challenge the likes of the defending champs this early in the season, the opportunity to face a top team has given the young Owls team a taste of what's to come this Saturday evening.

"This weekend will be good test against another incredible team in the Ohio State Buckeyes," said Turoff. "Navy has come on strong at the beginning of the season as well, and will add to an exciting meet which should be full of a lot of high-level action."

The Owls will have to do without the services of some key players, including Jason Russo, Alex Gorski, Adam Al-Rokh, and possibly sophomore Pat McLaughlin. With the exception of Al-Rokh, all are expected back in the line-up within the next two weeks.

Perhaps one of the biggest surprises thus far in the season is sophomore Tyler Croteau. The reigning ECAC Rookie of the Week is currently ranked fourth on floor exercise and seventh on the vault in the conference. Other standouts include John Vogtman and Andy Corp, the latter ranked third on parallel bars and fifth on high bar.

Fans who cannot attend the event live can take advantage of live streaming of the meet by signing up at http://all-access.cstv.com/cstv/player/player.html?code=tem