After two disappointing meets, Illinois’ men’s gymnastics rebounded with a 349.800-349.400 win against Iowa.

The Illini posted a season-high 58.450 point total on the high bar, the seventh-best score in the nation on still rings, a 15.500 by senior Jon Drollinger, and the fourth-best score in the nation on pommel horse, a 15.300 by freshman Daniel Ribeiro.

“This was crucial for me after last weekend’s performance,” Ribeiro said about his 13.200-point total last weekend at the Pacific Coast Classic.

“After last weekend’s performance, I was a little taken aback because it was that bad. But being able to hit a pretty good set today brought my confidence level way up.”

A lack of depth placed extra pressure on Ribeiro and the rest of the Illini, after head coach Yoshi Hayasaki determined early on last week that he wanted to rest two of his top performers – Wes Haagensen and Paul Ruggeri – this weekend to help them recuperate for the rest of the season.

While Haagensen got his time off, Ruggeri ended up competing after junior Chris Lung was forced out of competition with a nagging wrist injury.

Lung’s absence from the lineup put the Illini at a major disadvantage. Normally, a team will run as many as six gymnasts in each event, with only the four best scores counting toward the team total.

With Lung out, Illinois had just four gymnasts competing in four of the six total events, making all four routines crucial toward the final team total.

“Chris Lung was out, Wes Haagensen was out, Ross Bradley was out, Chad Weist is still out, Paul Ruggeri had to step in at the last moment, so considering the circumstances, we came out with a pretty good win,” Hayasaki said. “In those events that all four scores had to count, that’s a lot of pressure, there’s no question about it, and those guys came through.”

Even with a depleted line up, the Illini know that they still need to do far better against their competition to ready themselves for the rapidly approaching Big Ten Championships on April 4-5.

“In no means are we satisfied with being that close (scoring-wise to Iowa,)” senior Michael Boyer said.

“Even with our people out, we should have beaten them by more. It wasn’t our most fantastic meet; there were some good routines but way too many small mistakes to be happy with the performance in general.”