How Allie Stern is making most of her walk-on season with OU women's gymnastics
NORMAN — Before Baker Mayfield became an OU football legend, he was a walk-on athlete.
Allie Stern is doing the opposite.
The Sooners’ gymnastics standout has been a fixture in the vault lineup since her arrival ahead of the 2019 season.
But in deciding to stay with the Sooners for another season, Stern also had to decide to forego her athletic scholarship.
“That was something I really had to think about and I really had to talk to my parents about,” Stern said ahead of Sunday’s Senior Day meet against Arizona State. “But I made the right decision. I’m so glad I could be here another year. Although there were sacrifices, it’s all worth it in the end.”
Stern’s return allowed her another season to compete alongside Olivia Trautman, who arrived at the same time as Stern.
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“Sometimes it’s hard to watch her on the sidelines, because obviously I want her out there,” Stern said of the oft-injured Trautman. “But seeing her overcome all of her setbacks year after year, it’s something that I just feel like would be super-hard for me to do and watching her do it so effortlessly, I know it’s hard for her internally but you can never see that on her face. So watching her do that is very inspiring.”
After some early setbacks this season, Trautman has rounded into shape, recently earning a perfect 10 on the vault and working toward a potential return in the all-around in the postseason.
Stern and Trautman, along with Jenna Dunn and Ragan Smith, were honored in a Senior Day ceremony after the Sooners’ 198.400-195.925 victory over the Sun Devils on Sunday at Lloyd Noble Center.
Stern, who has been in the vault lineup for every meet this season, had a 9.875 Saturday.
Stern and Trautman became fast friends once they arrived in Norman, bonding as roommates.
While their friendship didn’t take long to develop, it also didn’t take long before they suffered setbacks.
Within their first month of arrival, Stern had suffered a broken thumb and Trautman had to get her tonsils removed.
“We had surgery within a week of each other,” Stern said. “K.J. (Kindler, OU’s coach) made us look at other dorm rooms because she thought our dorm room had bad juju or whatever.
“We got off to kind of a little struggle there but we definitely have come a long way since then.”
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Stern has been a part of two championship teams, and the Sooners are ranked No. 1 again this season.
OU’s vault lineup, with Stern playing a prominent role, is top-ranked as well.
It’s not just that the Sooners’ vault lineup is strong five deep, OU’s has eight 10.0 start value vaults at its disposal.
“It’s really cool to see because in years prior, we have struggled with vault depth,” Stern said. “We’re definitely very deep this year. It kind of compares to my freshman year when we had seven 10.0 start values and I was pretty much No. 7 all year. It’s cool to see how I have worked myself into the top six.”
Stern is set to graduate in May with a degree in biology with a double minor in psychology and Spanish.
Next year, she plans on staying in the Norman/Oklahoma City area to get work in before continuing her education.
“It’s been hard getting shadowing and clinical hours with gymnastics, so I’m going to take a year to get those,” Stern said. “After that, I’ll apply to some P.A. schools.”
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This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: OU women's gymnastics: Allie Stern making the most of walk-on season
