It was a rough start at Victor E. Court, as hundreds stood waiting for the national anthem to play. But half a minute passed and there was no music to be heard.

Then out of the silence came the voices of the NIU gymnastics team, leading an a cappella version of the Star Spangled Banner.

Although the team was able to rescue the national anthem, they could not pull out a win in their last home match of the year as NIU (2-6 overall) lost 194.800-196.250 to Michigan State (5-2).

NIU started off behind and never were able to recover. The closest the Huskies came to reaching MSU was after the third round of competition, when only 0.575 points separated the teams. But The Spartans used the final event to pull away.

One shining moment came as the two seniors on the team, Kristin Harrington and Ashlee Williams, were recognized in a final ceremony.

Williams also grabbed a first place performance in the uneven bars as she scored a 9.9000.

“It felt really good,” Williams said. “Just this whole meet we had a lot of energy, I’m excited to go out like this.”