Last Friday the LSU gymnastics team traveled to Salt Lake City, Utah to take on the University of Utah in a match.
It was a packed house to see the two teams compete.
However, a large and raucous group of the fans weren’t there for the event, they were there for TikTok star and influencer Oliva Dunne.
Seriously, there were people in the crowd with signs about her, along with her face, and at times the crowd chanted:
” WE WANT LIVVY”
And Olivia wasn’t even competing…
Two-time Olympic medalist Kathy Johnson Clarke was also in attendance as well, where she shared a creepy moment she had with a bunch of Dunne fans:
“I was walking out just behind you, Sam, and they were screaming to me, ‘Are you Livvy’s mom? Are you Livvy’s mom?’ Very disturbing. Creepy, actually.”
On top of that, the mother of Utah gymnast Jillian Hoffman took to social media, calling the crowd disrespectful:
“I am a mother of a Utah gymnast, as we were walking to the car the group swarmed my daughter and her teammate. They literally said to their faces, you are not Livvy but you will do, can we get a picture. (The group) also called my daughter Livvy 2.0. They were so rude and disrespectful. It was very hard for mama bear not to come out.”
(Jillian and her teammate) were approached by a large group of teenage boys, disappointed that LSU had already left the arena and they wouldn’t be getting the photos of their dreams.
They did not know the girls names. They just wanted photos with gymnasts and were disrespectful in the things they were saying. End of story!”
Olivia also felt the need to get involved and confront the situation, as she took to Twitter and said:
“I will always appreciate and love the support from you guys, but if you come to a meet, I want to ask you to please be respectful of the other gymnasts and the gymnastics community as we are just doing our job”
Needless to say, it was a whole mess. And now, LSU gymnastics is having to take the next step by hiring a security guard that will be standing outside their hotels as the team travels, according to the Advocate/Times-Picayune.
LSU’s coach Jay Clark told the outlet:
“That (bodyguard) will be in our hotel and outside our locker room and getting us to and from the bus at the venue. (The officer) will be there to create a perimeter that keeps everybody safe.
We want to be accessible to our fans with autographs and kids, but we also don’t want to bury our heads in the sand. We want to make sure everybody is safe at all times.
We are going to change some of the policies of allowing the girls to go into the stands immediately following a meet. We’ve always allowed them to go up there post-meet with their families and interact with them.
We want to make sure we still provide them with that time with their families, but there won’t be any more going into the stands and there will be a limited amount of time that they can interact with the fans in the stands over the rail and that will be monitored closely.”
I’d say that’s a great move, considering all the creeps out there who may be trying to stalk Olivia and the rest of the team.
Olivia has quickly become a superstar and one of the highest paid NIL athletes in college sports:
