Gymnastics puts streak on line today

The gymnastics team will put its 25-match home winning streak at Rose Arena at risk when it hosts Stanford at 7 p.m. today.

Bringing a big name school to Mount Pleasant doesn’t add any pressure to the No. 20 Chippewas.

Stanford finished the 2004 season in third place at the NCAA National meet, but are not ranked this season.

CMU is No. 5 in the nation in the floor exercise, while Stanford is No. 27. Central also is No. 15 on the uneven bars, while the Cardinals are No. 30.

CMU coach Jerry Reighard said he believes the balance beam will be the deciding factor in winning the meet.

“I have always said that stats don’t lie,” he said. “I think this is going to be a really close meet, and you are going to see some momentum shifts and we are going to have to rally on floor and they will have to rally on beam.”

The Chippewas will start the meet in Olympic order beginning with the vault, uneven bars, balance beam and finishing on the floor exercise.

Stanford is one spot ahead of CMU in the vault and balance beam rankings.

Central is coming off a win against Western Michigan, the balance beam was the only event the Chippewas struggled on. The team recorded three falls on apparatus, posting a season-low score.

Senior Sara Burtinsky will try to help the balance beam line-up as she is ranked No. 12 in the nation on the beam.

Burtinsky has garnered the Mid-American Conference gymnast of the week for the second consecutive week. She will compete against Cardinal freshman and Pac-10 gymnast of the week, Liz Tricase.

“I don’t really go out there and think of who I am competing against,” Burtinsky said. “I just go out there and try to do my job.”

Doing her job is exactly what Burtinsky has done as one of the teams top gymnasts. She was the top performer for CMU at Western last week after posting 9.85″s in three of four events. She also posted a 9.8 to claim the top spot on the balance beam. She also garnered the all-around honor for the second consecutive week.

“I think it’s a bench mark,” Reighard said. “There is no doubt that any sport here would feel the same way that we are called a mid-major team and people think we can”t compete at the Pac-10 level.”

Reighard said his gymnasts are just as strong as Standford’s.

“I think we are a much better team than Stanford,” he said. “They are going to bring ten division one athletes and I really feel that our athletes are just as good. Winning this meet will catapult us mentally into a whole different level of competition for the season.”

Central will travel to Kalamazoo and compete against WMU, Eastern, MSU and No. 2 Michigan at the State of Michigan Classic at 1 p.m. Sunday.