By Lindsey Boyd (@lindsboyd3):
Sitting in class, San Jose State gymnasts fidget with it. Seeing familiar faces, they wave with it. Texting friends, they send pictures of it.
“I’m doing it right now,” said all-around senior Kaitlin Won as she plays with the ring on her finger. “I’ll pull it on and off and put it on different fingers. It’s something that I’m always touching like ‘oh my god I have it. This is all mine.’”
Yes, the heavy, blue, name-engraved, Spartan-helmet-stamped, W.A.R. (we are ready) motto-inspired Mountain Pacific Sports Federation championship ring wrapped with the words “2017 MPSF Champions” on a silver band is finally all theirs.
SJSU landed No. 1 in its conference in March with a score of 195.925. This has only been accomplished once in 2004.
The team can finally flaunt proof that they are No. 1. Josten’s — the company known for making Super Bowl rings — brought the designs made by seniors Rachel Heinl, Erika Matos and Haleigh Shepard to life.
The team got a first peek at its rings during summer but boxed them away and waited for the official ring ceremony during the first football game of the season.
“When I first got it, my heart started racing,” said sophomore all-arounder Taylor Chan. “I put it on and my hands started getting hot and sweaty so I couldn’t get mine off.”
It was difficult for the girls to part with their rings in the summer. For Chan, this was literally the case. But since the rocks were presented at the ceremony, the team hasn’t taken them off.
“We wear it everyday as a reminder of what we did and as motivation to do it again,” said junior all-arounder Stephanie Relova.
From the outside, the rings share a uniform look. It’s what’s engraved on the inside, however, that makes each ring unique.
A personalized word that sums up the gymnasts’ individual journeys is minted into each ring. Won fittingly chose the word “all-arounder” and Chan engraved “MPSF Freshie” because she won MPSF Freshman of the Year.
“I chose ‘perseverance’ because my freshman year, I came in, and I blew out my knee,” Relova said. “I tore out almost all the ligaments in my knee so I had to come back last season and work really hard to get back into the gym and back on lineups and stuff.”
The rings not only represent the moment the team placed No. 1, but they represent the conditioning, the practice and the sacrifices made to eat right, sleep right and get good grades.
“The whole entire season comes back to me, not just that one moment,” Relova said while looking at her ring.
Chan, Won and Relova said they get chills just reflecting on the season. Another goosebump-worthy moment for the gymnasts came when women’s tennis and softball stood beside them in the end zone of CEFCU Stadium and were recognized together as conference champions.
“We sparked this motivation in other teams,” Won said. “It was like girl power you know… we went out there and did it and we killed our season.”
Gymnastics started the championship trend amongst SJSU athletics and advanced to nationals. It was followed by women’s tennis and then softball which both won the Mountain West Championship for their sports and advanced to the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
Gymnastics hopes to inspire its fellow SJSU men’s and women’s teams to improve their play and bring home more titles.
“We know that they are super competitive,” Won said of the men’s programs at SJSU. “All of our girls teams won and can motivate the boys teams for this year.”
The men’s teams have been titless in the conference for some time. Football hasn’t won since 1991.
With a drought in men’s titles, SJSU alumni are ecstatic to support the winning women’s teams. Several have even asked to try on the gymnastics championship rings.
The always humble Chan said she doesn’t like bringing attention to her ring, although her best friend is always willing to take her hand and show it off to everyone.
Instead of “Spartan up!,” the team’s new motto, according to head coach Wayne Wright, is “rings up!”
“He’s like ‘rings up’ and so we have to show him we have our rings on,” Won said. “It’s really important that we are showing our pride in the fact that we won and that we are ready to do it again.”
Besides conditioning and getting to know the new freshmen, the team is focusing on its mental game and committing to the same goal — to be back-to-back conference champions.
As for the rings, Chan said, “I can wear multiple at the same time.”
