The past few meets have been kind to the Illinois women’s gymnastics team. But head coach Bob Starkell was not afraid to make some changes before this weekend’s quandrangle meet in Seattle, Wash., even after the Illini posted their best meet in school history against Ohio State a week ago.

“It’s ve…The past few meets have been kind to the Illinois women’s gymnastics team. But head coach Bob Starkell was not afraid to make some changes before this weekend’s quandrangle meet in Seattle, Wash., even after the Illini posted their best meet in school history against Ohio State a week ago.

“It’s very important to switch things up, especially in a sport like gymnastics where there are so many changes,” Starkell said. “It’s always strange being in an unfamiliar setting, especially Seattle, which is a different time zone, and it was strange having a different rotation order because we never start with the floor exercise and end with the beam, never ever. I decided that we might as well just switch the lineup with our all-around competitors around a bit too.”

Despite all the changes, No. 14 Illinois still performed well, posting its best road score of the season (195.900). The Illini took a close second to No. 24 Washington (196.000) and were followed closely behind by No. 9 Oregon State (195.800) and Eastern Michigan (191.475).

“With such high expectations, we performed well, but now we just have to focus on doing well on our first event no matter what it is because that sets our tone for the entire night,” freshman Kelsey Joannides said.

Starkell and Joannides were nervous about ending the competition with the balance beam – one of the Illini’s most inconsistent events. Led by senior Julie Crall, who typically doesn’t compete in the event, Illinois adapted well in equaling its school-record score of 49.175 set in 2004.

“I think we did surprisingly well on the beam tonight because we had it all together by the end of the meet, and we had all mistakes out of our systems,” Joannides said.

Joannides and Crall tied for second in the beam with scores of 9.875. Sophomore Allison Buckley proved that she was back to full force on the vault, taking second and posting a 9.875.

Junior Nicole Cowart had a strong showing in all four events and took second place in the all-around.

“My biggest goal is to perform consistently during every meet,” Cowart said. “I want to be someone that my teammates can look up to as always doing a good job.”