Falling short

T-Birds finish third in conference

By DAVID DeMILLE
UNIVERSITY JOURNAL

Two falls on the balance beam and a surprisingly low score on uneven bars gave SUU a third-place finish at 195.375 in the Western Gymnastics Meet Saturday at the Centrum, with Boise State taking the title at 195.650.
The Broncos finished just ahead of Cal State Fullerton, which finished at 195.600, while Utah State, ranked first in the conference heading into the meet, scored a 194.350 to finish in fourth.
The Thunderbirds needed a high score to improve their chances of moving to the NCAA Regional Meet April 12, but were unable to hit on beam.
“We just counted falls, and you can’t do that,” coach Scott Bauman said. “I’m just proud of this team. It was a tough environment out there tonight, very hectic. We’ve never had four teams here and had so much going on.”
The T-Birds had a shot at still making the regional meet, but BYU scored a 196.025 against Utah Saturday to secure the sixth and final spot in the meet, keeping SUU out.
The conference title also escaped the T-Birds, and Bauman said if the team had been able to stay on the beam, it probably would have walked away as conference champs.
“We were in position to win this meet the entire time,” Bauman said. “We just couldn’t execute and take advantage.”
SUU had an otherwise solid meet. The ’Birds started the meet by setting the school record on vault with a 48.900, capped by sophomore Molly Bauer’s 9.925, also a new school mark. Senior Jayme Morgan added a 9.825.
“I changed the position of my layout, which makes it a lot more difficult,” Bauer said. “It was so exciting to do it tonight, with all of those former gymnasts in the audience. It was really cool to get better than anyone has at the school.”
The T-Birds followed with an unspectacular 48.725 on bars, despite hitting on routines that had been scoring higher in previous meets, and a 48.450 killed SUU’s chances of winning the meet, despite another school-record performance from senior Talayna Fortunato, who tied the school mark with a 9.925 and finished second in the meet.
“We were pretty solid,” freshman Sheena Shaw said. “We scored lower on bars than we usually do, even though I thought we hit everything, and we just made some mistakes on beam. If we make it to nationals we need to work on our confidence and stay up.”
The ’Birds had another impressive performance on floor to finish the meet, with a 49.300. Shaw and senior Sandi Lyman both scored 9.900s and finished in a tie for first in the event.
The T-Birds were able to compete in front of some graduated SUU gymnasts who came to watch the meet, and although the end result wasn’t as impressive as the team would have liked, the active athletes enjoyed having some former teammates and friends in the seats.
“We didn’t have out best stuff tonight, and definitely didn’t have our best meet,” Lyman said. “It was a fun atmosphere to