A college gymnastics star and her brother — who went viral for dancing at her meet — are helping to transform the sport by highlighting Black culture in her routines
Meredith Cash
Updated ·11 min read
Derrian Gobourne of the Auburn Tigers performs her floor routine.AP Photo/Stew Milne
Auburn Tigers gymnastics star Derrian Gobourne — dubbed "The Queen" — is competing at NCAA Championships in Texas this weekend.
The moment has been billed as a heartwarming show of sibling support, but the story goes deeper.
Derrian Gobourne is one of the most accomplished gymnasts in Auburn Tigers history.
But during one of the fifth-year senior's first meets of the 2023 season, it was her brother who was getting all of the attention.
Derric Gobourne Jr. was in the stands January 20 as the Tigers hosted Arkansas at a sold-out Neville Arena for their first home competition of the year. And as his younger sister prepared to close out the meet with her standout floor routine, Derric decided to step up and bring some energy to the crowd 9,121 strong.
Derrian celebrates a successful vault.Stew Milne/Getty Images
As Missy Elliott's "Lose Control" blared over the gym speakers, Derric slid into the aisle and broke out some impressive dance moves. At first, the cameras were focused only on him. But as his own routine continued, they panned out to reveal two close family friends — Donald Frison and Dale Hill — who lined up right behind Derric and matched him step for step in perfect synchronization.
"I just walked down there to the bottom of the stands just to support Derrian so she could feel us and so she could see us and know where we're at, which I do every meet," Derric told Insider. "And that song happened to play, which is a song that we both like, and I was like, 'Okay, I'm gonna dance.' And the cameras came and I was like, 'Oh, well, you're no stranger to this. Let's go.'
"But we didn't think anything about it because it's just how we are for each other all the time," he added. "And then it blew up."
Unsurprisingly — to everyone except the Gobourne siblings, that is — the dancing clip went viral in the days following the meet. Both Derrian and Derric gained multiple thousands of followers across TikTok and Instagram as the video gained traction and was reshared everywhere from ESPN to the "Today" show.
But the display, which has been billed as a heartwarming show of sibling support, was actually so much more than that.
The youngest of four siblings, Derric and Derrian Gobourne were born to perform
Like his little sister, who is just two years younger but undeniably "the baby" of the family, Derric has always had an itch to entertain. Their father passed along his love for singing and dancing, exposing his kids to "old school music, like new jack swing, Bobby Brown, and Michael Jackson" throughout their childhood on Florida's Gulf Coast.
"That's what we grew up on," Derrian told Insider. "That's where it all started, the love for music. My dad is also a dancer, and I watched my brother grow up dancing.
"I was just so in awe of him," she added of Derric. "I saw how everyone reacted and I saw everyone loved his energy. I just loved it, and I always wanted to be with him and dance with him. And I would always be his little dance partner.... Our chemistry together when we were dancing was just so natural and fun. So that's just how it was growing up."
Derrian (left) and Derric as kids.Courtesy of the Gobourne family
Derric recalled that they "pretty much did everything" together — singing, dancing, and "making up choreography" to keep themselves busy at home.
But big brother doesn't see their upbringing as particularly unique. That musical essence carried over to their church, their praise dance team, and their step team. They were surrounded by song and dance, which Derric notes is "a very big thing in Black culture."
"That's how we communicated [historically]," he said. "That's how we survived — music and dancing. And so that is something that is a big part of Black households is to sing and to dance and to emote in that way."
Derrian brought her musical spirit from the dance floor to the gym
Derrian branched out to other activities beyond singing and dancing when she was still young. When she tried cheerleading at age 5, Derric recalled his little sister completing a back handspring without any training — she simply learned to do one after watching someone else pull off the stunt.
"We knew that she was great since she was little," he added with a laugh.
Derrian and Derric with their mom, Tikisha.Courtesy of Derric Gobourne
Her progression to gymnastics was a natural one. After watching Derrian show off her athletic abilities in all-star cheerleading, the owner of the gym suggested that her mom enroll her in a gymnastics class.
She took to it quickly, and her success came as "no surprise" to Derric and the rest of the Gobourne family. But even as she rose through the ranks — eventually working her way to consistent Junior Olympic National Championship appearances — her partner in crime was fairly disinterested in the sport.
"To sit there and watch everybody do the same exact routine for like five hours, that was boring," Derric said with a laugh, adding: "It wasn't until she went to college, when I would go into these arenas and see people react to her, that I saw how great she was, honestly."
Compared to the sterile rigidity of the elite gymnastics pipeline, NCAA gymnastics is brimming with personality. Teammates cheer each other on throughout their routines, perform to fun, upbeat music, and add their own flair to traditional gymnastics skills.
Derrian competes on floor.AP Photo/Gareth Patterson
Derric — who went on to become a singer, songwriter, dancer, and producer — saw something he could work with in collegiate gymnastics.
"I'm a performance person, so clean is cool, but also people want to be entertained," he said. "They're not sitting there just looking to see a boring, clean floor routine.
"So I'm like, let's add some stuff that I know from dance competitions or just performing," Derric added.
The siblings — and folks they consider to be 'part of the family' — came together to create something 'unique' to gymnastics
Derrian made an instant impact upon her arrival at Auburn. In her debut season with the Tigers, she became the program's first-ever national champion with a stunning vault that earned a 9.95 from judges.
But all the while, her older brother had his sights set on floor — the gymnastics apparatus that arguably allows the most room for creativity. Using his dance background and performance expertise, Derric began helping Derrian with her floor routines to showcase both her staggering talent and her vibrant personality.
Derric edited the music. And he — along with Donald, a longtime dance teacher to both of the Gobourne siblings — choreographed her moves. Then Derrian, who's been dubbed "The Queen" on campus, was left to make the magic happen out on the floor.
"He knows me best," Derrian said of Derric. "I don't wanna go out there doing a floor routine, when I'm really not feeling it because I just feel like I can't really perform like that. I can't connect when I'm half going through the motions, because I don't feel it.
"And Donald means so much to me and my family," she added. "He knows what fits me and he knows what will help bring out the Queen, so he's been very special."
"I love bringing Black culture to not only Auburn, but to gymnastics — the dancing, the style, the pizzazz, everything," Derrian said. "I feel like it's so special and I feel like it allows me to stand out in a great way. And it's not only something that I can do, but it's something that I try to help others embrace as well."
His sister's impact isn't lost on Derric, either.
"When you think about Black people in American culture anyways, if you think of anything that existed before Black people got their hands on it, it is like, 'We gonna add that little extra garlic salt, we gonna spice that up,'" he said with a laugh. "And then that becomes what the standard is, you know?
"What these Black gymnasts are doing — specifically with their floor routines — will now be the standard of gymnastics," Derric added.
Derrian competes on floor during a 2021 meet.AP Photo/Butch Dill
Derric isn't sure "enough words exist to start to describe how proud" he is of his "baby sister" for her role in revolutionizing her sport. But for most of Derrian's college career, he's been watching her from afar.
As a member of the Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe, Derric has seen show contract after show contract overlap with Derrian's gymnastics season. Before the meet against Arkansas where he, Frison, and Hill went viral, Derric hadn't traveled to Alabama for a competition in several years.
So when he finally visited campus for the Tigers' showdown against the Razorbacks, Derric — flanked by Donald and Dale — exuded all the energy he could muster. He knew how much "Derrian loves people to hype her up" and "feeds off of that kind of energy," so before her highly anticipated floor routine, he did what the pair do best: He danced.
It should be noted, the perfect synchronicity from Donald and Dale wasn't exactly planned. The friends just recognized the moves — which Derric explained as common "party dances in the Black community" — and jumped right in.
"If one of us sees that we're about to start this one move, you know what's coming next," Derric explained. "And we all dance with each other all the time... We all have danced with each other so much at this point that we just know."
From left: Dale, Derrian, Derric, and Donald.Courtesy of Derric Gobourne
The arena buzzed in anticipation around them. But for Derrian, who was feeling some pre-routine nerves, looking up into the stands to see Derric, Donald, and Dale dancing "helped me really calm down and just settle into doing a great floor routine."
"That actually was something that I really needed," she said. "It just helped me get out of my head and zone back into it just being fun.
"In the back of my mind, knowing that Don and my brother and Dale are there, I think I do show out a little bit more on accident," Derrian added.
It worked like a charm. Derrian had the crowd on its feet by the end of the routine, which earned an average score of 9.95 from the judges.
One fan in particular caught Derric's attention.
"I saw in the stands this little white girl doing Derrian's crown [move] when she saw Derrian, and I was like, 'Wow,'" he said. "When you think of where we grew up and how we grew up, you don't think about those kind of things and how impactful your baby sister's going to be to all kinds of people.
"I tell her that the scores don't really matter that much because she's bigger than the scores," Derric added. "And that her impact is what will leave her legacy in Auburn gymnastics and college gymnastics, period."
Derrian has a similar perspective. Her collegiate gymnastics career, she says, has all been about "trying to inspire" others.
Derrian completes one of her passes on floor.Stew Milne/Getty Images
"I feel like I've been given a gift to perform and bring joy and love and togetherness," Derrian said. "And I feel like I bring that every time I do a floor routine. And yeah, scoring big is great, but I think my main message is to show confidence, love, joy, and be big, take up space."
As for the older brother who helped bring that message to the masses?
"That's always gonna be my dance partner," she said.
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