Utah’s gymnastics team has the talent, the leadership and the experience to win a national title. The only thing left to do is win it.

Anyone who knows sports understands winning a national title is a difficult thing to do. In gymnastics, that mysterious element of luck, momentum, mojo or whatever you want to call it, often plays a part in deciding the outcome at nationals because there is so little that separates the top teams.

This year the Utes feel like they should be there in that final mix once again.

Utah finished third last year behind Oklahoma and Florida after leading following the first two rotations. Only .45 separated Oklahoma from Utah, a margin so slim the Utes know they were only a few cleaner routines or big vaults away from winning.

That feeling puts them in a great position going into the 2022-23 season, which begins Jan. 6 against LSU in the Huntsman Center, since the Utes return 21 of the 24 routines used at nationals last year.

“We have so much depth on this team,” sophomore Grace McCallum said. “We have more confidence, too, going into meets knowing we have so many people backing us up.”

While they were extremely strong last year, there was one area in which the Utes felt they needed to improve the most. The Utes lacked six 10.0 vaults, which put them at a slight disadvantage.

This year they should be able to field six, thanks to the addition of Abby Brenner, a fifth-year gymnast who was an All-American on the event at Michigan.

“She is going to help us on that event and we have a lot of growth within,” Utah coach Tom Farden said. “We can go 11 deep on the event because we have some nice fulls, too.”

Actually, the Utes are eight deep or more on all events. McCallum, Maile O’Keefe and freshman Makenna Smith can all contribute on three or more events while Brenner and several other returners such as Amelie Morgan, Abby Paulson, Jaedyn Rucker, Lucy Stanhope and Sage Thompson all could be regular contributors on multiple events.

The Utes also have Cristal Isa returning for a fifth year. She can be a big contributor on the balance beam and bars and provides the veteran leadership that served the Utes well last year with Sydney Soloski handling that role.

“She is such a light-hearted positive person,” Farden said of Isa. “She is endearing to the other athletes so her contributions are more than just gymnastics.”

The good thing about the Utes is that they seem to know they have all the elements needed for a winning combination, but are willing to put in more work, too.

As last year showed, Farden’s group is a hungry bunch very much wanting to end Utah’s title drought that dates back to 1995.

There is an appreciation of the history of the program, after all many came to Utah to experience the large crowds and understand the legacy, but they want to create their own successful history.

Winning the Pac-12 is part of that, but the Utes acknowledge the NCAA title is the ultimate goal.

“We made it no secret we want to build a team that can compete at the highest level and can be competitive in the finals,” Farden said. “That is every coach’s dream and it hasn’t changed for us. We were ahead after two rotations at nationals last year and now we have to come back and figure out how to complete a meet, that is the coaches’ job.”