The No. 17 Illinois women’s gymnastics team will compete in the NCAA Regionals in Morgantown, W.Va., against five other schools — including Big Ten rivals No. 8 Nebraska and No. 5 Michigan. The Illini lost dual matches to both teams and finished fourth overall at the Big Ten Championships.

“We’re put with Nebraska and Michigan as the top two seeds, so we know our competition,” junior Amber See said. “We’ve competed against them a few times this year, so it will be like Big Tens all over again.”

In order to advance to nationals, Illinois will need to finish in either first or second place at regionals, a feat that will likely require flawless routines from everyone.

“It will take for us to believe in each other and the routines that got us there,” senior Alina Weinstein said. “We’re going to have to be pretty much perfect, but that’s something we can do.”

Michigan and Nebraska have both been strong all season, as they finished first and third in the Big Ten, respectively. The other three schools competing are No. 19 Kentucky, North Carolina and host school West Virginia. 

Illinois, who finished seventh in conference after an up-and-down year, was content with its performance at Big Tens but still sees room for improvement moving forward.

“We scored really well at Big Tens, and that shows us going into regionals that we’re capable of scoring that high,” See said. “But we also had some mistakes at Big Tens which shows us that we have the chance to improve our scores.”

Head coach Kim Landrus said the team’s approach is to go into regionals with the same goal they’ve had all year, to hit 24-for-24 routines.

As has been the case throughout the season, the Illini will need to get all the little details, including amplitude and execution, correct in order to advance, but they will also have to be self-assured.

“I think our score relies a lot on confidence, and right now, these guys are set,” Landrus said. “We’ve prepared them, they’ve had a great season, and we just have to continue the mental approach. With everything we work on in training as far as team activities and whatnot, we just have to continue to do that and go in and do our job.”

After making nationals as a team in 2011, the Illini failed to do so in 2012 but sent Weinstein as the 10th individual qualifier in school history in the all-around after she won the regional all-around title.

This season marks the 10th straight year Illinois has been selected to compete at regionals, and if the Illini were to advance, it would be the second time in the last three years they had done so.

“If we want to make it to nationals, we’re going to have to improve a lot, especially against these two great teams (Nebraska and Michigan),” See said. “We honestly have nothing to lose, and we’re going into it with a positive attitude. We’re the underdogs, but we want it just as bad as them, so we’re going to leave it all out there.”

Heading into what could be the Illini’s final meet of their season — and the seniors’ final meet of their careers — Weinstein said the concept is hard to grasp.

“It’s a very hard realization,” Weinstein said. “For me it’s hard to think about that this might be the last meet of my career. But we’ve had such great momentum this year, and if we keep it up, we have a very real possibility of going to nationals.”

See said that win or lose, the team wants to go out on a solid performance.

“We would love to make it and continue our season,” See said. “But if we go in there and put everything on the floor and don’t make it, we know that we gave it our all.”

Nicholas can be reached at [email protected] and on Twitter @IlliniSportsGuy.