Trouble appears to be far from over for the California Golden Bears’ gymnastics team. Quincy Walters, a talented gymnast from Texas Dreams Gymnastics, had originally set her sights on joining Cal for the 2025–26 season. But in mid-2025, she made the surprising decision to switch gears and commit to Michigan instead, bringing her skills and energy to the Wolverines’ women’s gymnastics team. That was a big shock to the bears, and as they might have recovered from that, another gymnast, a level 10, is also leaving them.

“Took a SEC to figure it out😉 I am EXTREMELY excited to announce I am committing to the University of Missouri on a full athletic scholarship!! I want to thank my coaches and whole team at @brandyjohnsonsgymnastics, as well as my parents, for supporting me through this whole process! I wanna give a special thank you to @mizgymshannon @whitney_snowden @jackieterpak and @laceyyrubinn for giving me the opportunity to join their amazing team, and I could not be more excited to be a tiger!!! MIZ🐯” read the caption of Imani White’s Instagram post as she posted a picture of her wearing a leotard of Missouri gymnastics.

Previously, White was committed to Cal-Berkeley in October 2024. This is a great loss to the Bears as White is a 5-star gymnast. She trains at Brandy Johnson’s Gymnastics in Florida and is renowned for her exceptional performances, particularly on the uneven bars. She has achieved a perfect 10.0 on vault, ranking her No. 1 nationally, and holds top-20 national rankings on bars and beam. In a Reddit post talking of the decision, the fans are feeling nothing but pity for the Cal Women’s gymnastics. This comes after the Cal women’s gymnastics program underwent significant changes.

In June 2025, Geralen Stack-Eaton, a two-time NCAA champion and former NCAA Gymnast of the Year, stepped in as the program’s 14th head coach. She brought with her 11 seasons of experience as an assistant at Minnesota, where she helped guide the team to three NCAA Championship appearances and a Big Ten title. A great coach, but it was Justin Howell and Liz Crandall-Howell who had built this team since 2012.

Howell, who took the helm in 2012, became the winningest coach in Cal gymnastics history, amassing over 230 wins. It is after their departure that the team is in a crisis, and the fans just feel sorry for them.

Fans feel pity for Cal Women’s gymnastics

The gymnastics community is taking pity on the bears. You know it’s serious when you find a comment that says, “I’m not even really a cal fan but I feel so sorry for them bro 🙁“. Another comment that could give stress lines was, “Poor Cal 😢 the only sport I root for the bears in lol“. Just imagine this: just last season, you were the ACC Regular Season Champions, a national runner-up in the 2024 season, and yet, even before the 2025-2026 season could kick off, fans of a different team and a fan who only likes you for gymnastics are feeling sorry for you. Just an example of how quickly things can go bad.

One fan said, “It’s crazy to think that just a year ago they came close to a national championship.” In the 2024 season, the California Golden Bears women’s gymnastics team had almost felt the touch of the NCAA Trophy. This was their first-ever national runner-up finish. They narrowly missed the title, finishing second with a team score of 197.850, just 0.375 points behind national champions LSU, who posted a 198.225. Another user questioned, “Man, what happened with Cal? I don’t follow college gymnastics, but even I know they’re losing a ton of recruits.” Sydney Snyder, a top recruit who had committed to Cal, much to fans’ disappointment, announced her switch to Clemson.

The move came 24 hours after Clemson University announced that Crandall-Howells would be its new co-head coach.”The Howells did such a phenomenal job at Cal. I don’t know much about the new coach and wish them all the best and success. But I worry that the program will be on the chopping block in the next few years. It’s been a looming threat for a long time and now the program is more vulnerable than ever.” This was another comment. If we talk about Howells, well, they were the ones to get the bears to their best-ever NCAA finish. Under Howell’s leadership since 2012, Cal has qualified for the NCAA tournament every year.

In 2020, Justin Howell was voted the WCGA Regional Head Coaches of the Year, while Cal gymnasts claimed a school-record eight All-Pac-12 honors on top of three Regular-Season All-America awards. Now that they’re gone, they seem to be falling apart, an issue that needs to be addressed. Otherwise, what the comment says about the program being on the chopping block will come true.