This Just In: Olivia Dunne Still A Competitive Gymnast At LSU - And A Good One

BATON ROUGE, La. - People may have forgotten that Olivia Dunne is an actual gymnast for No. 2-ranked LSU.

She has such a presence and influence on social media with 7.9 million TikTok followers and 123,500 on X along with television commercials and constant media attention, some may think she is an actress, singer or a daughter of a celebrity.

But she is wrapping up her senior season on the LSU gymnastics team as a full-time student majoring in interdisciplinary studies. She is a three-time Southeastern Conference Academic Honor Rollee and a 2022 Women's College Gymnastics Association Scholastic All-American.

LSU gymnast Olivia Dunne is competing regularly this season after missing most of 2023 with injuries. (Getty Images).

Dunne, 21, will compete in likely her last LSU home meet Friday against North Carolina (8:30 p.m., SEC Network +) with more performances expected at the SEC Championships on March 23, the NCAA Regionals April 3-7 and possibly the NCAA Championships April 1822 in Fort Worth, Texas.

After only four meets last season because of shoulder, bicep and foot injuries and the distractions of being famous, Dunne will compete in her seventh and counting meet Friday.

"This year's just been a blast," Dunne told reporters this week at a press conference with teammate Sierra Ballard and coach Jay Clark. "I'm so focused on the end of this year and bringing home the national championship."

Olivia Dunne In Key Utility Role For LSU Gymnastics Team 

LSU (11-3, 5-2 SEC) has come close, but has never won a national title in gymnastics. This could be the year as it has one of the nation's best in senior all-around Haleigh Bryant and a very deep team. Dunne would likely be in the six-woman rotation on another top 10 or 15 program, but she is in a utility role at LSU. 

"Haleigh is the most humble person probably ever, and she is the best college gymnast to walk the planet," said Dunne, who is one of the most famous current college athletes - man or woman - on earth.

Dunne, a native of Hillsdale, New Jersey, is ranked third in the country in Name, Image & Likeness earnings at $3.6 million behind USC basketball player Bronny James (son of NBA great LeBron James) at $4.9 million and Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders (son of Colorado coach Deion Sanders) at $4.7 million. Iowa basketball superstar Caitlin Clark is fourth at $3.1 million, according to On3.com evaluations. Texas backup quarterback Arch Manning is No. 5 at $2.8 million with LSU basketball star Angel Reese at No. 8 at $1.7 million.

Former LSU pitcher Paul Skenes and Olivia Dunne have been dating since last summer. (Getty Images).

It is difficult not to see Dunne somewhere. One of her latest NIL partners, Nautica apparel, recently put up a gigantic video billboard of Dunne at Times Square in New York City. And she is still dating former LSU pitcher Paul Skenes, the first player taken in the 2023 Major League Baseball Draft last summer by Pittsburgh.

Olivia Dunne-Paul Skenes LSU's Version Of Taylor Swift-Travis Kelce?

Baton Rouge Advocate columnist Scott Rabalais called the all-star couple "LSU's version of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce."

Dunne has also found time to relocate her freshman form at LSU in 2021 when she was an All-American on the uneven bars with a 9.844 average and 9.90 effort at the NCAA Championships. That was the spring before all hell broke loose with the beginning of NIL that summer when she was already a burgeoning Warren Buffett entrepreneur of women's athletics.

Last Friday night, Dunne put up a 9.875 on the uneven bars in her first effort at the event this season against Texas Women's University at the Raising Cane's River Center in Baton Rouge. She also tied her career best in the floor exercise with a 9.90.

"This has been my favorite year at LSU," said Dunne, who finally has found a balance with her high-flying career out of the gym and the one in it. Before, she was basically on the uneven bars.

LSU gymnast Olivia Dunne has balanced athletics with modeling and a series of NIL endorsements. (Getty Images).

"My summer's are usually pretty hectic," she said. "So it's all about finding a balance between these brand deals that I put off doing in the season that I do during the summer and staying in the shape to be a D-1 athlete."

Dunne has NIL deals with Vuori Clothing, American Eagle, Forever 21, Nautica, Motrorola and Accelerator Active Drink, among many others.

Still, she found time to get to Omaha, Nebraska, to see LSU at the College World Series that it won.

"This year I had a different approach because I treated it like it's my last, and it is," she said. "I'm a senior. So I really wanted to make the best of it. It's really paying off."

Dunne did say, though, that she has not decided yet if she will or will not come back for her COVID fifth season.

"I've been so happy, and I've just had so much fun," she said. "My approach has been different than the years in the past. Not more seriously, but I just definitely didn't have the right balance for me as a person before with NIL and balancing school work and practice. I'm staying in shape, going into the gym more, fueling my body properly."

Olivia Dunne Is LSU's ‘Sixth’ Woman

As a result, she helps give LSU valuable depth going into the postseason soon.

"When she's gone in, she's delivered," Clark said. "She's dependable, and her role has been as a utilitarian a little bit in terms of going in when we need her to. How many great basketball teams have a great sixth man? She's done an excellent job of handling it and embracing that role."

Even when she was not participating much, Dunne always was a good teammate. Part of her NIL packages even gives money to her teammates. 

In other words, she does not have her own office in the LSU gymnastics facility the way former Denver quarterback Russell Wilson did with the Broncos before coach Sean Payton.

At LSU, ‘Livvy’ Dunne Is ‘Olivia’ Dunne

"No, it hasn't been like that," Clark said. "If she didn't adopt that attitude of being part of the team and just being one of the team, then we'd have a problem on our hands. Liv's a great teammate. All this stuff that has gone on with NIL, it could've infected or destroyed the team. Maybe it has hurt other teams in other places. To Liv's credit, to every one on our teams's credit, there were times when the national exposure over it could've been a distraction. But it really hasn't been."

Dunne's teammates call her by the name she first had at LSU - Olivia. NIL morphed that into Livvy.

"We don't call her Livvy," Clark said. "That's another person. It's Olivia, or Liv. When she's in that gym, she's a gymnast. I'm her coach. Her teammates are her teammates. She's a student at LSU. Everything the Internet perceives is not part of our day-to-day interactions."

Olivia Dunne is coming off an excellent night last week in both the floor exercise and uneven bars for LSU. (Photo by James Gilbert/Getty Images)

NIL can be a dirty word in college football and basketball, but so far not so much on the LSU gymnastics team after some initial distractions for Dunne.

"I don't think it was about desire for her, or lack of, or anything like that," Clark said. "NIL was uncharted territory. This whole NIL phenomenon, which she was certainly the leading edge of that for all women in college sports. She has a better handle on that. She has done a great job and has been more emotionally grounded and stable."

Dunne already has left her legacy at LSU via "The Livvy Fund," which gives back to her teammates.

"A big part of what I want to leave at LSU is that you can have it all," she said. "You can be a student-athlete and an entrepreneur and have success in all areas." 

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