When Sara Carver-Milne oversaw Olympic silver medalist Alicia Sacramone’s dual NCAA and elite gymnastics careers in the late 2000s, she was the first to find herself in this unique situation since Kelly Garrison juggled both while at Oklahoma in the late ’80s. Flash forward to the 2023 season, and it would almost feel absurd for an Olympian joining an NCAA team not to at least consider pursuing elite alongside collegiate gymnastics, with Olympic champion Sunisa Lee headlining the push at Auburn.
While Sacramone may have finished her competitive career at Brown in 2007, Carver-Milne’s tenure with the Bears lasted until 2022. During her 21 seasons in Providence, she was named ECAC Had Coach of the Year twice and oversaw every school record being broken. Simply put, Carver-Milne is an Ivy League gymnastics coaching legend, but now she’s looking to make a splash in the big leagues.
The story all started around 2013 when Carver-Milne was hired to help out at an Auburn gymnastics summer camp.
“We’ve known each other enough that I’ve known she was a good fit for the program, but actually coaching alongside her was just confirmation. We typically try to bring in other college coaches to our camps just so that we can get some exposure for our campers, and…
