Individual titles not the top priority for No. 18 Gymnastics
Gymnastics could send an individual athlete to nationals, even if the team doesn’t qualify through regionals Saturday.
If an event winner is from one of the four teams that doesn’t advance to nationals, that athlete moves on. The top two in all-round from the bottom four teams also advance to nationals, held April 18-20.
“Not that I wouldn’t want to go, because that would be a cool experience, but I wouldn’t want to go without my team,” said senior Emily Heinz. “That’s who I’ve been with the whole time, that’s who’s got my back. I wouldn’t want to be out there by myself, it wouldn’t be the same.”
Heinz isn’t the only Chippewa putting the team goal above the individual goal.
“I’d much rather go with the team,” said junior Halle Moraw. “I do think that me and a bunch of other girls have a very good shot if we hit our routines. We are very clean; we’re right up there with the other teams.”
Several Chippewas could advance on their own, including junior Taylor Noonan on balance beam and Moraw and sophomore Taylor Bolender on floor. All three are ranked in the Top 25 in the country.
Head coach Jerry Reighard said junior Kylie Fagan also has a good shot Saturday on bars. Fagan’s 9.95 at the Mid-American Conference championships earned her a MAC individual title.
The Chippewas have sent six athletes to the NCAA championships in program history, the last coming in 2004. Three Chippewas advanced in 2003, the year CMU had its best chance to advance as a team.
“That’s one of the things that really slingshot the 2003 team when we took three individuals,” Reighard said. “If you’re contending for that championship, then you’ve obviously got some of the best kids on each event.”
Reighard said he routinely points to the banners and boards hung inside the multi-purpose room to remind his gymnasts what they could accomplish.
“(Advancing to nationals) would be a lifelong accomplishment that they will relish and cherish for as long as they live,” Reighard said. “They get real tired of me taking them to some of the boards in the gym and pointing out what happened in the past. They have expressed to me that they want to be the team that I’m pointing to and saying, ‘You’ve got to be like that team.’ I think it would mean everything to them.”
Heinz and senior Brittany Petzold won't have another chance to practice in the multi-purpose room if they don’t advance Saturday.
“The biggest reward I could get is getting our team on the wall, (being) first-time national qualifiers,” Heinz said. “I’m just ready to go in there and not have this be the last week I do gymnastics.”
