Carolina inks Lexi Cappalli, Josseyln Mackey and Sarah Peterson to national letters of intent.
• 2002 NCAA Southeast Region Assistant Coach of the Year • 2004 NCAA Southeast Region Assistant Coach of the Year • 2011 EAGL Assistant Coach of the Year
Penny Jernigan enters her 18th season as North Carolina's balance beam and floor exercise coach. She has developed several talented Tar Heel gymnasts, including All-Americas Christine Robella and two-time national champion Courtney Bumpers. Bumpers was a balance beam All-America in 2003 and a floor exercise All-America and national champion in 2004 and 2005.
Jernigan also has coached the only three gymnasts in Carolina history who have earned perfect scores of 10.00 -- Bumpers and Anna Wilson (2003) on floor exercise and Brooke Wilson (2001) on balance beam.
Jernigan is a 1992 graduate of Campbell University, where she attended on an academic scholarship and received the McKinney Book Award for Excellence in Journalism. During her years at Campbell, she coached Junior Olympic gymnastics in Raleigh. After graduating, she served as the Level 10/Elite & TOPS girls' team coach at GymCarolina Gymnastics Academy. She developed numerous state, regional, national and international gymnastics competitors.
In 1994, Jernigan became a NAWGJ (National Association of Women's Gymnastics Judges) official. She earned her National judge's rating in the summer of 2005 and is one of only three collegiate coaches in the U.S. to maintain this rating.
Jernigan was named the NCAA Southeast Region Assistant Coach of the Year in 2002 and again in 2004. She became Carolina's associate coach in July 2010.
Coach Jernigan launched the gymnastics team's social media channels: Facebook, YouTube and Scribd in September 2010. She created and posted hundreds of feature articles, interviews, highlight videos and over 2,500 gymnastics photographs. In just a few months, facebook.com/uncgymnastics became one of the top four most popular collegiate gymnastics fan pages in the nation.
In 2011, Jernigan received the EAGL Assistant Coach of the Year honor; the team's home meet attendance doubled; Carolina won its fifth EAGL conference title and junior Morgan Evans won the program's first NCAA regional all-around title. Evans also became Carolina's seventh individual finalist to advance to the NCAA national gymnastics championships.
Coach Jernigan's role expands to include becoming the team's liaison to the Carolina Leadership Academy in 2011-2012.
Jernigan and her husband, Rayme, have a daughter, Blythe Starling (7).
