Gymnastics face a busy weekend competing with EMU and Texas Women's University


The Central Michigan undefeated gymnastics team will be busy this weekend with meets Friday and Sunday this weekend.

The Chippewas (5-0, 2-0 in the Mid-American Conference) will face Eastern Michigan (0-1, 0-1), and Texas Women’s University at 7 p.m. Friday in Ypsilanti.

Texas Women’s University (3-1) will follow CMU back to Mount Pleasant for another meet at 1 p.m. Sunday in McGuirk Arena.

Friday’s meet against Eastern Michigan should give CMU its biggest challenge of the weekend, and more important because it is an in-conference match.

“The Friday night meet will be the important meet. It’s the MAC meet counter for us,” head coach Jerry Reighard said. “To continue to control our own destiny we need to have a MAC win against Eastern.”

While CMU has a road meet, it’s a luxury that the team only has about a two-hour ride. Reighard doesn’t believe that fatigue will be a factor because the Chippewas will still be sticking to their basic routine over the weekend.

“If we were on the road I think that would be a bigger factor,” Reighard said. “We’ll be back home Friday night, and then we’ll have our team meal on Saturday night. We’ll be ready to go on Sunday.”

CMU is coming off a win despite what Reighard said was a disappointing performance against Ball State.

The high standards Reighard has for the team remains a focus for the weekend. The team totaled a score of 193.350 against Ball State. That is three points less that Reighard’s goal of 196.

He said he is trying to get him team to think differently going into this weekend.

“They need to come outside of their own little bubble. We kind of locked ourselves into a situation, we’ve conditioned ourselves to do what we want,” Reighard said. “My statement to them is if you think like you’ve always thought, then your going to do like you’ve always done. We have to think totally different.”

Against Ball State all three all-arounders, Kristin Teubner, Brittany Petzold, and Rebecca Druien, scored below 39 points.

“I think our whole situation that we put ourselves into is we’ve settled on this plateau on the mountain,” Reighard said. “Right now we don’t think we can climb to the next plateau.”

In order to change the mindset of the team, Reighard is willing to take some chances.

“The danger in gymnastics is that when you do something different it could have a little bit of ramifications. That’s when you make mistakes that cost you more,” Reighard said. “I’m willing to take that chance because the team has to climb off that plateau and reach the next level, that’s the plan this weekend.”

Share: