Gymnasts place second at quad meet; Iowa takes first

Online Poster

Online Poster

By Majesh Abraham

While women’s gymnastics managed to beat UIC and Illinois State, they fell a few tenths short behind Big Ten rival Iowa to finish second at the quad meet Saturday night.

The Illini scored 193.475 points, but it wasn’t enough to overcome Iowa, which totaled 194.025 points. UIC finished third with a score of 192.675, and Illinois State finished last with a score of 187.025.

Head coach Bob Starkell was disappointed with the loss, but thought the meet revealed promise in his team.

“We performed well, but we had a couple of large mistakes that cost us,” Starkell said. “That was the difference between us and Iowa, they didn’t make any big mistakes which they had to overcome. But our young girls performed really well, and they did a good job stepping up.”

The Illini were boosted by the return of senior Lauren Newcomb, who came back from an injury last week to take home her fourth all-around title of the season.

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Newcomb’s performance didn’t surprise Starkell.

“It’s really kind of par course for her; she came in and she did pretty much what she’s been doing,” Starkell said. “She’s just on a real consistent level, and [the consistency] makes her feel strong and confident, and it’s great for us when she comes out and performs in four events.”

The Illini posted the best overall team score in the floor exercise, highlighted by the performances of redshirt senior captain Kara Kapernekas and junior Katie Wild who finished second and third on floor exercise with scores of 9.800 and 9.775 respectively.

The Illini also had a strong performance in the vault, highlighted by senior Ashley Williams who tied for first in the event with a score of 9.825.

The team’s strong showing in these two events surprised Starkell.

“[Vault] and [floor] have been pulling through for us, where I would think our other two events are stronger,” Starkell said. “It has a lot to do with the young people coming and doing well. But we’re still hoping to build on both of those events, because right now I don’t feel we’re at our full potential, and we have a lot of room for improvement.”

Freshman Krystal Melcarek contributed with a career best and tied sophomore Cara Pomeroy for second overall in the uneven bars with a score of 9.775. Senior Margaret Dann put up the best Illini score on the beam with a score of 9.725.

Starkell said the closeness of the meet might have led to the girls putting undue pressure on themselves, causing uncharacteristic mistakes. It also didn’t help that he had to shuffle his line-up again this week because of injuries.

The coach will get a good measure of the team starting next week, because they hit the road again in a border battle against Missouri. it will be the beginning of a three-week road stretch for the Illini, which includes stops at Michigan State and Texas Women’s University.

“We’ve performed well, but it’s hard to evaluate right now, because of the injuries, and the line-up changes,” Starkell said. “We need to focus on little things like body position and where we start and finish, and in general we just have to concentrate on the things that we have control over, and we should do pretty well.”