Aggies narrowly miss second place finish at Texas Woman’s quad meet
Many Aggie gymnasts took home career-high scores, but the Utah State gymnastics team missed out on second place by a fraction of a point against No. 10 Oklahoma, Centenary and Texas Woman’s University in Denton, Texas, on Jan. 21.
“We opened up on beam and scored two points below than we should have, and we just couldn’t quite recover for the rest of the meet,” USU head coach Jeff Richards said. “We did well on vault and uneven bars, but it just wasn’t quite enough to bring us back. We should have had a much better meet.”
Oklahoma won with a final score of 197.450. The Aggies were behind the TWU Pioneers by 1/10 of a point. TWU came in second with 192.425, closely followed by the Aggies with 192.325. Centenary College took fourth place with a final of 191.400.
Richards said the balance beam was a rough start for the Aggies.
“We had a couple falls,” he said. “Only two girls stayed on.”
The Aggies were in fourth place after the third rotation and five points behind first-place OU.
Freshman Kaitlyn Betts earned a career-high 9.72 on the uneven bars and helped the Aggies pull back to third place on the last rotation.
USU junior Amelia Montoya, a junior from California, broke her personal record on the uneven bars with a 9.800. The Mission Viejo, Calif., native nailed her landing on the vault to give her a new career high of 9.750.
Freshman Sarah Landes, a native of Edmund, Okla., said the Aggies started slow.
“We just went into the meet not our normal, hyped-up selves and started as what seemed kind of dead as a team,” Landes said. “After that we picked up the energy and finished strong.”
Landes came away with a score of 38.925 in the all-around competition, taking second and setting a new career high in all but one event. Paige Jones placed fifth, and Montoya took sixth.
“My vault was probably one of the best vaults I’ve ever done, but I love the beam. It’s one of my strongest events. I really enjoy it,” Landes said.
Freshman Ashley Follet, who is no stranger to TWU’s Kitty Magee Arena, was on her home turf this past weekend. She is originally from Flower Mound, Texas, and had her family, friends and old coaches and teammates there to support her.
“I was the first on the beam, and I hit my routine, and I got a 9.6,” she said. “It was really fun and cool to hear people cheering for USU.”
Follet is one of seven freshmen on the team this year. With such a young team, Richards said it is going to be a bit of a building year.
“The freshmen have really stepped it up,” Richards said. “We’re just taking it one meet at a time, working on the little things, like sticking landings, getting hands down and staying focused. It will get there — just working on it week by week, putting it together.”
Follet and Landes both said they agree.
“I think it’s going to be a year to watch and just a progressive year for Utah State gymnastics,” Follet said.
“It’s a fresh start and we’ve been building off of it, and it’s going great right now,” Landes said. “So expect great things.”
The Aggies next compete in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum Friday, Jan. 27 when they host Southern Utah and Boise State.
– kristi.lambert@aggiemail.usu.edu