Aggie gymnastics look to get back in the rankings with upcoming meet
Ray Corn was right.
Just as the Aggie gymnastics coach predicted after last Friday’s season-best performance in the Spectrum against the Southern Utah University Thunderbirds, the Aggies dropped back in the national rankings.
Despite a score of 195.675, USU fell from the No. 25 spot to No. 30.
The rankings are based on the Regional Qualifying Scores. These scores are based on a team’s three best home and three best road scores. The top home result is dropped, and the remaining five scores are averaged.
The Aggies did, however, improve their RQS following the meet with SUU from 193.085 to 193.205.
The reason for USU falling back in the rankings was due to other teams behind them who had not yet competed in enough meets to qualify for an RQS score.
And, even though the Aggies fell a little in the rankings, Corn said he was pleased the with the fact his team gained some momentum.
The 30th-ranked Aggies will look to carry forward that momentum and improve their RQS once again in a home meet tonight at 6:30 against the Alaska-Anchorage Seawolves.
After the SUU meet (a meet in which eight individual season-high scores and five career-high scores were notched), Corn said his team was “on a quest” to win conference meets and return to the regional championships.
Tonight’s meet is not a conference meet, but a solid performance could boost the Aggies’ RQS and help them meet the second goal Corn mentioned.
Katy Schilla, Jessica Parenti-Otte and Meagan Lewis are three gymnasts the Aggies will rely on to keep up the momentum of last week’s meet.
Schilla is tied for 21st in the nation on the vault with an RQS of 9.845. Parenti-Otte ranks 22nd in the all-around (38.970), 44th on the beam (9.770) and 65th on the bars (9.770). Lewis is 46th nationally with a 38.440 RQS in the all-around.
There certainly won’t be much worry tonight about the visiting team putting up a higher score than the Aggies.
The Seawolves have yet to post a score this year better than their opponents’, hence their 0-8 mark on the year.
Making things worse for UAA is the fact that they are coming off of their worst score of the season – a 181.775 mark against Cal-State Fullerton. UAA’s season-high score was a 189.675, tallied Feb. 9.
USU has scored no lower than 190.000 this season.
The beam, where the Aggies had two falls against the Thunderbirds, is the area they will look to improve on.
Nationally, USU is 39th as a team on the beam with an average score of 47.825. That is the lowest the team ranks of the four events.
They are ranked 19th (48.810) on the vault, 27th on the floor exercise (48.440) and 31st on the bars (48.340).
-sbhislop@cc.usu.edu