Jones wins all-around on Senior Night
Utah State gymnastics honored seniors Haley Hogan and Rebecca Holliday on Monday for Senior Night, but it was a sophomore who stole the spotlight against Brigham Young University.
USU’s Paige Jones won the all-around with a career-high 39.200. She shared the vault title and claimed sole possession of the beam title on her way to the win.
Despite Jones’ big night, the Aggies fell to BYU in the dual meet 193.675-195.525.
The Aggies opened up the meet on vault and pushed through low start values to score a 48.300 on the event.
“We actually had a great vault,” Richards said. “We changed a few things this week, and we actually had a higher start value than we have in the past.”
Jones said the gymnasts are aware every vault is important.
“We have to really make our values count, because we don’t have some of the higher start values,” Jones said.
Freshman Sarah Landes flipped for 9.75 before Jones stuck the landings of both her vaults perfectly to score 9.850.
On bars for the first rotation, BYU hung three scores higher than 9.8, including a 9.850 from sophomore Raquel Willman, who tied with Jones for the win.
After sliding to second last week, the Aggies are back atop the Western Athletic Conference on bars but struggled to post high scores on the event. Junior Amelia Montoya fumbled a move from high bar to low bar, and freshman Kaitlyn Betts was unable to catch a release and fell to the mat.
Jones posted a 9.850 to tie for the win.
“Going into bars we felt very confident,” Richards said. “I don’t know what happened. That’s not our typical team.”
On beam Utah State freshman Ashley Follett landed a career-high 9.775. Hogan matched Follet’s score for her own career best in the event.
BYU once again posted three scores of 9.800 or higher for the second time that night.
Utah State floor scores continued to get better. After posting a season high Friday, the Aggies came close again scoring a 48.750. Freshman Sarah Landes tied with Jones at 9.800 for a team high.
“We’ve done a lot of numbers in practice — routine after routine,” Jones said.
The Aggies head to Cedar City for their third meet in a week to take on Southern Utah University.
“For now we will figure it out,” Richards said. “We’ll come out in these next two meets and try to boost that score up a little bit.”
– meredith.kinney@aggiemail.usu.edu