Utah Utes gymnastics: Vault scores rescue stumbling Red Rocks at NCAA prelims
The low beam total had the Utes in for a fight even after two events with UCLA, Stanford and Michigan, and then they started floor with a fall and soon had a step out of bounds that cost them 0.1 point, leaving them going into their final event needing to score 49.20 to nose out UCLA for third place and a qualifying spot in tonight's Super Six national championships at Stegeman Coliseum.
Luckily, vault has been Utah's best event this season — though floor was maybe its second-best — and the Utes put together a 49.40, the highest vault score of the 12 teams in the preliminaries, to move into second place for the session — easily qualifying for tonight's finals, along with top-ranked, top-seeded Georgia and Stanford out of the evening session and Florida, LSU and Alabama out of the afternoon session.
"We gave 100 percent tonight, and I hope we can get the adrenaline back up," said Georgia coach Suzanne Yoculan. "We had a peak performance with the exception of three (minor) mistakes. We can't do a whole lot more."
Utah senior Ashley Postell — the 2002 world beam champion and 2007 NCAA beam champion and top-ranked beam performer all season in 2008 — was a bit disappointed in her score on that event, thinking the only thing she did wrong in a routine judged at only 9.875 was a slight hop on the dismount.
"Aside from my dismount with a little hop, I felt it was a good routine for me," Postell said. "I had those couple meets where I was a little shaky on my series, and I finally feel good about my beam routine. I was a little shocked, but the scores have been tight all day."
She was also docked hard for a step on vault, another event on which she ranked No. 1.
Those deductions kept her from winning the all-around. She finished second for the third straight year.
Still, Postell was happy to still be competing tonight. "The only thing that matters is that we qualified," she said.
By luck of the draw after Thursday's competition, Utah will start tonight's finals at 4 p.m. MDT on balance beam, not the easiest place to begin because it's hard to channel nervous energy into the event that least needs explosiveness. Marsden said it didn't matter where Utah started. Georgia will start on floor.
Recent comments
I was there. It was a good meet for second place. Georgia was near...
Larry Griffin | April 26, 2008 at 12:26 a.m.
i was watching the meet on the internet, i left after the first 3...
red rocks all the way baby | April 25, 2008 at 2:49 p.m.
Well great job girls. Bring home the title.
Red really does Rock | April 25, 2008 at 2:14 p.m.
