Michigan State Gymnastics: Former Spartan Alina Cartwright joins coaching staff

The Michigan State Spartans gymnastics team added to its coaching ranks earlier this week. Former Spartan Alina Cartwright was announced as the new volunteer assistant coach.

Hailing from Naperville, Illinois, Alina Cartwright was a four-year letterwinner at Michigan State. While at MSU, she received first-team All-Big Ten honors in 2014, becoming the first Spartan to do so since 2010. Cartwright finished fifth in the All-Around at the 2014 NCAA Baton Rouge Regional Championships later in her career. She still holds three of the top-eight vault scores in program history, posting a 9.950 three times (2013, 2014 and 2015). Cartwright also remains one of just eight Spartans in the 1,000 point club.

After her four years as a Spartan, Cartwright joined the staff as a student assistant for the 2016 season. She then worked as an assistant coach for the past four years at Alaska Anchorage from 2017-2021.

Cartwright joins the current staff that features head coach Mike Rowe, associate head coach Nicole Jones, and assistant coach Whitney Snowden. Per Michigan State’s release announcing the news, she will work primarily with choreography for the Spartan beam and floor routines, along with working in several other areas.

While Cartwright worked with the UAA Seawolves, the team experienced its top season in program history in 2019. All in all the team saw 17 schools records broken, including season average and National Qualifying Score (NQS) marks on bars, beam, floor and overall. The 2020 Seawolves’ also improved the program record in 2020 for bars NWQ and team score average, areas Cartwright helped oversee.