INDIANAPOLIS – The Navy gymnastics team continued adding to its collection of postseason awards with the announcement of the 2020 USA Gymnastics Men's Collegiate All-Americans, USAG Coach of the Year, USAG Assistant Coaches of the Year and USAG Scholar-Athlete awards. As a program, Navy collected 12 All-USAG honors and four USAG Scholar-Athlete honors. Individually, the coaching staff of head coach Kip Simons and assistants Craig Holt and Colin Payne swept the USAG's coaching awards.
 
Finishing the season as the number five team in the nation, the Mids took home the most USAG Collegiate All-American nods with 12. The 2020 honors were determined based on the final statistical rankings following the tenth week of action, March 9. The top-six gymnasts in each event garnered the title as USAG Collegiate All-American this season. Typically, these awards are based off of the performances at the USAG Collegiate National Championship.
 
A testament of Navy's depth and success this season, two Midshipmen earned accolades on each event. Frank Bradley (Sr., McLean, Va.) and Josh Williams (So., Cypress, Texas) were recipients for their work on the floor exercise. Williams was additionally honored on the rings, alongside his teammate Ryan McVay (Jr., Roseville, Calif.). Williams was the top scorer on the rings amongst USAG gymnasts in 2020 with a national qualifying average (NQA) of 14.000. McVay picked up his second 2020 USAG Collegiate All-American nod in the parallel bars category with fellow junior Max Gerber (Dix Hills, N.Y.). The duo of Dan Clark (So., Avon, Mass.) and David Toussaint (Jr., Warren, Ohio) garnered kudos for their performance on the pommel horse. Clark was the USAG's high scorer on the pommel horse with an NQA of 13.617. Connor Van Loo (Fr., Freeland, Mich.) led the entire USAG on the vault as he turned in a 14.517 NQA to earn honors. He was joined in the vault discipline by Lucas Beltran (Sr., Corpus Christi, Texas). The final two Mids to earn the title of 2020 USAG Collegiate All-American were Cash Buske (So., Madison, Wisc.) and Ben Provost (Sr., South Hadley, Mass.). The pairing ranked second and third respectively in the USAG standings for the high bar.
 
The USA Gymnastics organization also recognized four student-athletes from Navy's team as 2020 USAG Scholar-Athletes. These four gymnasts are members of the junior and senior classes and possess of cumulative grade point average of 3.2 at the end of the Fall 2019 semester. Representing Navy on list are seniors Ben Provost (3.84 GPA, Applied Mathematics), Ryan Orce (3.61 GPA, Mathematics) and Cian McConnell (3.41 GPA, Aerospace Engineering). From the junior class Max Gerber (3.63 GPA, Aerospace Engineering) was honored by the USAG.
 
Echoing the ECAC announcement from last week, Navy's coaching staff was selected as the best in the USAG. Kip Simons was named the 2020 USAG Varsity Head Coach of the Year, while Craig Holt and Colin Payne were acknowledged as the 2020 USAG Assistant Coaches of the Year. This is Simons' second USAG Varsity Head Coach of the Year honor during his first five seasons leading the Midshipmen as he garnered the award in 2019. Added to five prior nods as USAG Varsity Head Coach of the Year as head coach at Air Force, Simons is now a seven-time recipient in his 15 years as a collegiate head coach. Holt and Payne also both repeated from 2019. During his 21 seasons, Holt has now earned the USAG Varsity Assistant Coach of the Year award four separate times (2020, 2019, 2008, 2006).