The Oregon State gymnastics team will open the 2023 season with a trip to Las Vegas. The Beavers are among the 16 teams who will compete at the Super 16 at Orleans Arena on Friday.

Oregon State is one of the featured teams in the evening session and will compete against Pac-12 rival Stanford, as well as Georgia and Rutgers.

The last time the Beavers and Cardinal faced off was at the Seattle Regional, where Stanford ended Oregon State’s season by the slimmest of margins at that meet after the Beavers had earned a share of the Pac-12 regular-season championship.

On Tuesday, Oregon State coach Tanya Chaplin said the team was “appropriately disappointed” by that result, but has used that experience in a very productive offseason.

“You always want to go further and you start looking at different things you can do and change,” Chaplin said. “I think this team has been very, very good with that this preseason. Looking forward to seeing where that takes us this season.”

Junior Sydney Gonzales, who competes on vault, balance beam and the floor exercise, said the team was both proud of its season and disappointed by the ending.

“Overall, I think we really looked back on the journey and (were) really proud of what we had accomplished. Really looking forward, we’re really hungry and determined to do better this year and I’m excited to see what we do,” Gonzales said.

Jade Carey won the Pac-12 Conference and Seattle Regional all-around titles last season as a freshman and created national interest in Oregon State gymnastics. The Olympic gold medalist chose to continue her elite career and was part of the United States team which won team gold at the World Championships in Liverpool, England, in October.

Carey also brought home an individual gold medal in the vault and a bronze in the floor exercise.

Chaplin said the entire Oregon State gymnastics program cheered her success.

“You’re watching that as a friend, as a teammate. … You want it for her because you’ve watched her struggles, her triumphs, her victories and you know what she’s going through each week,” Chaplin said.

With Carey returning for her sophomore year alongside teammates who helped the team to a Pac-12 title last year, there is unprecedented interest in the sport in the Willamette Valley. The Beavers will not host their first home meet until Jan. 21, but Chaplin said there has already been a record number of season tickets sold.

“To build off of what we had last year and knowing what we have coming in this year, I’m really, really excited for it,” Chaplin said, adding that Gill Coliseum is like no other arena. “You have your whole home crowd here for you and so that is like the seventh person up on the event and it makes a big difference with the energy, the enthusiasm.”

In addition to Carey, Oregon State returns fifth-year senior Madi Dagen, who placed fourth in the all-around at the Seattle Regional.

Senior Jenna Domingo, a specialist on the balance beam and uneven bars, said the team has worked hard in the preseason and she thinks everyone is ready to compete.

“Conditioning has been a lot more heavy,” Domingo said. “The numbers have been really consistent. We’ve been putting a lot of work into conditioning and starting routines fairly early, too. So I think all of that time preparing from our preseason has really prepared us for our opening meets.”

Junior all-around Ariana Young said she did not create new routines this offseason and instead focused on perfecting the routines she used last season. Consistency is the main goal.

“We put a lot of work into details and making sure that we’re strong and confident in what we’re doing. I think we’ll be able to showcase it a lot in the future this season,” Young said.

Carey was not the only standout freshman for Oregon State last season. Lauren Letzsch and Phoebe Jakubczyk were regular contributors and others emerged late in the season, including Kaitlin Garcia, who scored a career-best on vault at the Seattle Regional.

“We have now a large freshman class from last year that have that experience and it’s not all brand-new being thrown at them,” Chaplin said. “They understand what’s coming. It’s not that they didn’t get it, but it’s just different when you’ve been through a season. And then you have the sophomores and juniors from last year that are now upperclassmen, and they’ve really, I feel, stepped into their own and they’re really thriving right now.”