Photo by Tim Carpenter

Ward-Sessions breaks into Aggie record books as USU wins quad meet

The Utah State gymnastics team traveled to Morgantown, W. Va. Sunday afternoon to in a quad-team meet against Pittsburgh, Cornell, and host-team West Virginia. During the meet, the Aggies put up a new season-high score of 196.075 to win their first quad meet since 2015.

The score of 196.075 tied for the fourth-highest road score in Utah State program history.

“We have been talking about energy and staying in battle mode from the moment they salute at the start of their routine until the moment they salute again at the end,” said Utah State head coach Amy Smith. “It wasn’t a perfect meet for us today, but it was a really great meet.”

USU was able to win two individual events, and the all-around title thanks to senior Madison Ward-Sessions. Ward-Sessions claimed the all-around title with her personal-best score of 39.525, which is tied for second all-time in school history and is the highest score by any Aggie in the past 16 years.

Ward-Sessions took home the beam title with a career-high 9.900, which added to her now 32 career titles. Along with the beam, Ward-Sessions tied for second on the bars (9.850), floor (9.925), and vault (9.850).

“I was so excited,” Ward-Sessions said of the team’s performance. “We were so pumped and very relaxed today. I wasn’t really thinking about all my scores adding up. I was just thinking about one thing at a time and it paid off.”

Sophomore Logan Varnadore won the other individual title for USU on the vault with her career-best score of 9.875. Twin sister Leighton Varnadore earned third in the all-around category with a score of 39.100.

The Sunday meet got off to a great start on the bars, where the Aggies nabbed a season-high 48.900, thanks to Ward-Sessions’ 9.850 and junior Makayla Bullitt’s 9.800.

In the second rotation of the meet, another season-best (48.950) was recorded on the beam with the personal-best 9.900 from Ward-Sessions. Fellow senior Emily Briones placed second in the event with a 9.850, and sophomore Autumn DeHarde rounded out in third with a 9.775.

On the floor, the Aggies continued their hot streak with another season-best score of 49.175 in the event. Along with the career-high score from Ward-Sessions, DeHarde tied for fourth in the event with 9.875 to help aide the team to victory.

Utah State placed in the top three spots on the beam, as Logan Varnadore took her spot at first with her 9.875 while Ward-Sessions took second. Leighton Varnadore tied for the third spot with her personal-best beam score of 9.825, which gave the Aggies another season-best score of 49.050.

“I am proud of the team for accomplishing what they did,” Smith said. “They did not let down one bit, which was awesome to see. We kept pushing and we skipped right over the 195-mark and went right to 196, which is pretty cool.”

The team will return to Logan and go head-to-head with Alaska Anchorage on Friday, Feb. 22, at 7 p.m. in the Spectrum.


Twitter: @lomeli_lauren