Ohio State has mutually agreed to part ways with women’s gymnastics head coach Meredith Paulicivic, the university’s Department of Athletics announced Tuesday, Nov. 10, ending a nine-season tenure that carried the Buckeyes to five NCAA regional finals.
Randy Monahan, the program’s associate head coach, will serve as interim head coach for the 2027 season, Ohio State said in its announcement. The change comes before the new season begins, giving the current roster a familiar voice in the gym while the program resets its leadership.
“Making a change of this nature is never easy at a time like this,” Ross Bjork, Ohio State’s Senior Vice President and Wolfe Foundation-Eugene Smith Endowed Athletics Director, said in the university’s announcement. “We’re going to do everything we can to support the student athletes, as well as Coach Monahan, throughout this transition. We wish Meredith and her family all the best.”
Paulicivic took over the program in May 2017, according to Ohio State, and guided the Buckeyes to five NCAA regional finals — the round that decides which teams advance to the national championships. College Gym News, which reported the announcement the same day, noted the timing: the move lands one day before the national signing period opens, when programs across the country begin locking in their next recruiting classes.
That timing is what makes the decision consequential beyond one season. Rosters in college gymnastics are built years ahead through recruiting, and a coaching change on the eve of signing period puts every verbal commitment and every recruiting relationship in play. Ohio State’s announcement did not address the status of any incoming class, and the program has not said whether a national search for a permanent head coach will begin now or after the 2027 season.
The departure also closes a chapter that Ohio State itself had recently extended. In July 2024, the university announced that Paulicivic had signed a contract extension through the 2027 season, saying at the time that she had led the Buckeyes to record heights in her first seven seasons. Tuesday’s announcement, framed as a mutual agreement, did not give a reason for the change or address the remaining contract term. It is the second Ohio State coaching change in a week, following the football program’s move covered in Ohio State’s dismissal of its special teams coordinator, and it lands in the same stretch as the men’s basketball team’s early-season win over Marshall — a busy November across the athletics department.
What we know — and what we’re still waiting on
Confirmed from Ohio State’s announcement: Paulicivic is out after serving as head coach since May 2017; she led the team to five NCAA regional finals; Monahan is the interim head coach for the 2027 season; and the athletics department describes the parting as mutual. Still unanswered: why the change was made now, whether a permanent search will run during the season, and what it means for the recruits expected to sign this week.
Monahan’s appointment is the program’s short-term answer to that uncertainty. As associate head coach he already knows the roster, the routines and the staff, and Ohio State’s announcement made support for the student-athletes the stated priority of the transition — gymnasts who committed to a program and a coaching staff that has now changed at the top.
For the Big Ten, the move adds one more program in transition in a conference where gymnastics depth has grown sharply, and where regional-final appearances — the standard Paulicivic’s teams met five times — are the baseline expectation for a school with Ohio State’s resources. The Buckeyes’ 2027 schedule has already been set by the program, so the competitive calendar Monahan inherits is fixed; only the leadership above it has changed.
Paulicivic arrived in Columbus with a long coaching résumé in the sport, and her Ohio State tenure included the program-record scores the university cited when it extended her contract in 2024. Tuesday’s brief announcement offered no farewell statement from her, and no details of any next step for her career.
What happens next is a season that now runs on an interim basis: Monahan leads the Buckeyes into 2027, the signing period opens with recruits deciding whether Columbus is still their destination, and Ohio State decides — publicly or quietly — how and when it will name the program’s next permanent head coach.
Photo: Nova Crystallis, CC BY-SA