Gymnastics drops season finale
Senior Ashley Potts balances on the beam in the Huskies’ 195.375-195.200 home win Feb. 25 against Ball State. Potts scored a 9.900 all-around Saturday.
March 19, 2018
DeKALB — The gymnastics team dropped a close meet to the Bowling Green State University Falcons Saturday by a score of 195.700-196.475.
Despite the loss, Head Coach Sam Morreale said he was happy with the team’s performance.
“We had a really good day,” Morreale said. “We just got outscored at the end. We had a really solid day, so I’m pretty happy about it.”
The Huskies started the day on the uneven bars with a collective score of 49.000. Senior Ashley Potts led the way with a score of 9.900, which stood as the meet high for the event.
“I think we did a really good job with the first kid up on each event today,” Morreale said. “It helps set up the rest of the kids on the event after them. I thought we started events really well.”
The second event for the Huskies was the vault, where they snuck away with a .100 advantage over Bowling Green. Potts scored a 9.850, which led the team again. Her vault score was second in the event, trailing Bowling Green sophomore Jovannah East, who won the event.
NIU went to the floor exercise for its third event of the day. Junior Anna Martucci continued her success on the floor exercise by scoring a team high 9.900. The Huskies finished just .200 short of Bowling Green State with a collective score of 49.150.
The Huskies finished the day on the balance beam where senior Katherine Prentice led the meet with an impressive score of 9.925. NIU scored 48.500 on the beam, its lowest event score of the day.
Prentice finished with a second place all-around score of 39.225. East scored higher with an all-around score of 39.425.
“Katherine Prentice had a really solid day as an all-arounder,” Morreale said. “I think her 9.925 on beam was her career high, which was really good for her.”
The Huskies will head to the Mid-American Conference Championship 2 p.m. Saturday in Mount Pleasant, Michigan, to take on six other schools from the Mid-American Conference.
“This is the type of week we want to have leading up to [the MAC Championship],” Morreale said. “We had a lot of success and a really good day to build off of with the championship next week. It’s going to come down to which team hits the most and the cleanest.”