Alabama won't have to travel far for its NCAA gymnastics regional.

The SEC champions and No. 5 overall seed will head to Auburn on April 4 for a spot in nationals. The rival Tigers will also compete in its Auburn Arena as the next-best seed in the regional. The top two teams advance to the championships April 17-19 in Fort Worth, Texas.

On top of the obvious national implications, Alabama has its 112-meet winning streak over Auburn. It came close to falling March 8 in Birmingham before taking the 197.200 - 197.025 win in the non-conference meet.

"We always embrace the rivalry between our schools and I think that definitely pushes us to be a little bit better," senior Kaitlyn Clark said. "The fact that we don't have to travel across the country or fly, it's just so close."

A year ago, it went to Seattle to compete at Washington's regional before coming home for the NCAA championships in the BJCC.

It should also create quite an atmosphere in the building that seats 7,424 for gymnastics. Clark hopes to see something in the 50-50 range with Alabama fans driving south.

At 112 meets, is there a burden to continue the streak even if a second-place finish still sends Alabama to nationals?

"I wouldn't necessarily say it's pressure," junior Lauren Beers said, "at least not for me. But obviously it's something we'd like to keep going as long as possible. Auburn is an up-and-coming team and they've been doing really great this year. So I think their time in the gymnastics world is starting to come up and I really expect them to be successful in the next couple years as well."