Utah gymnastics win regionals; qualify for championship

(Deseret News)


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FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — The Utah gymnastics team rode a clutch performance on the balance beam and a big floor score to take a come-from-behind victory at the NCAA Fayetteville Regional.

Utah, which scored a 197.300, advances to a record 39th-consecutive national championship, along with runner-up UCLA (196.600). Arkansas finished third (196.375), followed by Arizona State (194.425), UC-Davis (193.900) and Utah State (191.875).

Utah stood in third place after two rotations after a somewhat subpar bar performance and a clutch beam set that Greg Marsden termed its best of the year. But UCLA and Arkansas would still have to navigate the beam and Utah had its best two events ahead — floor exercise, where the Utes are ranked No. 1 in the country — and vault.

"The leg events are our strongest events," said Marsden, whose program remains the only one to qualify for every NCAA Championship — this being the 33rd. "We looked forward to this rotation (bars, beam, floor, vault). The biggest surprise was that we looked nervous on bars to start the meet. We didn't make any big mistakes, but we weren't sharp."

Utah sharpened up on the beam, an apparatus that would later knock Arkansas for a loop. All six Utes hit their routines for a 49.20 score, which would tie for the best beam score of the night with UCLA. Mary Beth Lofgren led the way with a 9.90 and Kailah Delaney earned a 9.85. Even so, the Utes, who were tied for second with Arkansas after one event, lost ground and after two rotations, Utah sat in third with a 98.45 behind UCLA (98.65) and Arkansas (98.625).

While Utah was in its locker room for its final bye of the night, Arkansas ran into trouble on the beam. By the time the Utes emerged for their last two events, they were positioned to take the lead, which they did with a 49.525 on the floor, which again tied UCLA for the top event score. Becky Tutka (9.925), Georgia Dabritz (9.925) and Nansy Damianova (9.95) finished the floor for Utah with a flourish. While the Utes were cleaning up on floor, the Bruins were struggling on bars, and Utah leaped from third to first.

With only vault remaining for the Utes, their 147.975 led UCLA (147.400), Arkansas (147.100) and the rest of the field.

The Utes got a little sloppy on their vault landings, but were big in the air and their 49.325 was the best score on the apparatus by any team. Though Utah won or tied for first on three of the four events, for the first time this season, the Utes were shut out of individual awards.

No one was complaining though, starting with Marsden. "This was a scary meet and all of the teams made mistakes, though we didn't make any big ones. There's a tremendous amount of pressure at regionals. It's one and done if you don't finish in the top two. I never take it (qualifying into nationals) for granted. It never gets old and when people ask if I'm nervous, I say ‘yes.' If you're not nervous in a meet like this, it's time to get out of the profession."

Like Marsden, his team wasn't nervous heading into the final two events. Said Nansy Damianova, "We were going into our two best events and we were confident because we got through the other two events (bars and beam) and that took the pressure off. We were able to really enjoy our last two events."

The NCAA Championships are two weeks off, April 18-20 in Birmingham, Ala. Utah will be competing in the evening semifinal on April 18. Some regions were not in as of press time, but Utah knows it will meet UCLA for the fifth time this season and fourth time in its last five meets in the second session. Also in with the Utes are Florida and Penn State.

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Liz Abel, University of Utah

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