It was a career second to none. Andree Pickens finished her tenure with the Alabama gymnastics team as a two-time NCAA Champion who helped lead her team to the 2000 Southeastern Conference title and the 2002 NCAA Championship.

She earned 14 All-American honors, won seven SEC titles on the way to being named SEC Gymnast of the Year an unprecedented three times.

And she had a fairy tale ending to her career. She came back from a devastating injury to win a team and individual national championship. She was then honored with every major award available to a collegiate gymnast, including the NCAA Top VII award, the most prestigious award given by the NCAA.

But if you ask her about her career, the first thing she's likely to mention is the pride she felt when she earned Scholastic All-American honors last spring. Pickens, who led everyone in the athletic realm, said that at times she felt like the lost duckling among her classmates, all of whom were Scholastic All-Americans early and often in their careers.

"I just knew that they had what I wanted and I wasn't going to be satisfied until my name was called out with theirs as a Scholastic All-American," Pickens said.

And this year, when the Tide is recognized during halftime of a men's basketball game for the academic accomplishments of the 2002 season, Pickens name will be called out as a Scholastic All-American, after earning a 3.62 for her senior season.

Pickens dreams of Scholastic All-American impressed coach Sarah Patterson as much as anything else in the Houston, Texas native's career. One day during her junior year, during a particularly trying week in the classroom, Patterson asked a visibly distraught Pickens what was bothering her. The normally sunny Pickens burst into tears, explaining that she was not where she wanted to be in the classroom.

"I tried to console her," Patterson said. "I mean at this point she had already earned Academic All-SEC and was having a great year in the gym. I told her that she had accomplished things in her career that every gymnast dreamed of. She looked up at me and said that all she wanted was to earn a 3.5 grade point average for the year so she could be a Scholastic All-American. She told me, 'I would give up every other honor and award I have for just that one'."

"That told me all I'd ever need to know about Andree Pickens."

The other aspect of her career that Pickens holds dear is the people she has met along the way, the ones that have helped her become the person she is today.

"Everyone I have come in contact with has influenced me in some way," Pickens said. "Here at Alabama, I can't even count the number of people who have made a positive impact on who I am today. The people you are surrounded with here at Alabama, they present you with the opportunity to be truly great and then from there, it is up to you to take advantage of it."

It was a senior that set Pickens on her path to greatness as a rookie and a freshman that helped her make it down the homestretch to one of the finest individual seasons in Alabama history.

"Gwen Spidle took me under her wing from my recruiting trip on," Pickens said. "She guided me through all the highs and lows of my freshman year. Gwen is the one that patted me on the back when I needed it and the one who kicked me in the butt when I needed that."

And while it was a veteran that set her on her way, it was the youngest of the Tide family that made sure Pickens finished up with a bang.

Pickens had torn her Achilles tendon just days before the Tide left for the 2001 NCAA Championships. She immediately had surgery to repair the damage. At that point her doctors told her there was a nine to 12 month recovery period. She was quick to tell them that she didn't have that kind of time. It was a tough time for Pickens.

"It was a real roller coaster," Pickens said. "When my team mates were putting together their routines, I was learning to walk. I felt my senior year slipping away."

But Pickens wasn't alone. Freshman Michelle Reeser had torn her Achilles tendon during her senior year in high school. She went through the rehab step by step with Pickens and in doing so, helped carry her through.

"They say it takes two to make a thing go right," Pickens said. "For me - Michelle Reeser absolutely got me through my senior year. When ever I was grumpy in the fall doing rehab, and I was grumpy a lot, she brought me back. That sense of excitement and wonder, that attitude of "gosh, we've got to get going because I don't want to miss a minute of this." That absolutely got me through it. She pushed me physically and pulled me emotionally. I owe her more than she'll ever know."

And when you try to get her to talk about her senior year, about coming back from a torn Achilles injury in nine short months and not only being as good, but in most instances, better than she was before, she talks about what the team accomplished.

"My absolute best moment? The national championship," Pickens said. "That moment after beam, when we knew we'd won...we were all laughing and crying. Even when I watch it on TV, I still get teary. That was a true team moment in what was a true team championship. We all went through so much and finally we were all on the same page, wanting the same thing, going in the same direction and we'd done it. It was just perfect."

"And then," she said with a smile, "I didn't let go of the trophy for a whole day."

Pickens let go of the trophy in time to compete in the individual finals of the NCAA Championships. In her rookie season, Pickens became the first freshman to compete all four event all three days of the NCAA Championships, winning the NCAA Balance Beam title in the process.

As a senior, Pickens became the first gymnast to compete in all four events all three days twice during a career. It was an exhausted Pickens that made her way to her last event, the uneven bars.

"I was so tired," Pickens said. "I don't think my body was really moving until after the floor exercise. Before I went up on the uneven bars I realized that this was my last routine and that there was nothing to lose. I just went out there and enjoyed it. It was one of those pure moments."

For Pickens, that moment, all the special moments and memories that she carries, could have only come at one place.

"There has never been a doubt in my mind that this is the only place where I could have enjoyed this level of success," Pickens said of her extraordinary tenure. "No other program would have taken as good a care of me physically from beginning to end. No where else would I have been pushed to excel in academics the way I was. This was the best place for me to become the best person I could be."