Central Michigan University
No. 15 Illinois
Chippewas Fall to No. 15 Illinois
1/11/2015 12:00:00 AM | Gymnastics
By Andy Sneddon, CMUChippewas.com
MOUNT PLEASANT, Mich. - A major step up in competition, and an improved performance.
But still, very little satisfaction.
Illinois defeated Central Michigan, 195.175-193.475, Sunday in a non-conference gymnastics meet at McGuirk Arena. The loss left the 23rd-ranked Chippewas 1-1. They opened with a near nine-point victory last weekend over Division III Wisconsin Eau Claire.
The Illini are ranked 15th. CMU entertains Eastern Michigan and Seattle Pacific on Saturday, Jan. 17, in a tri-meet at McGuirk Arena.
CMU's Halle Moraw and Kristin Stambaugh tied for first place Sunday on the floor exercise, and Moraw captured the balance beam to lead the Chippewas. Moraw scored a 9.825 on the beam, while she and Stambaugh both recorded a 9.8 on the floor.
The Chippewas recorded four scores of 9.8 or better on the day. Kylie Fagan posted a 9.825 in finishing second on the uneven bars.
CMU's Sunday score was much better than the 192.550 it posted last week against Eau Claire, but it was nowhere near where coach Jerry Reighard and his athletes had hoped to be against the Illini, and expect to be as the season progresses.
"We did have a long tough week," Moraw said looking back on the week of practice since the victory over Eau Claire. "We've done a lot and I thought we'd come in here and dominate. We hit and hit and hit routines. We've done the pressure, we've done everything in the book we could have possibly done. Our practices are what we were doing for MAC week last year.
"We're still not where we want to be."
It didn't help that the Chippewas lost Taylor Noonan, one of the team's six seniors and a captain, to a knee injury in practice on Thursday. Reighard said it wasn't a season-ending ACL tear, but he was unsure on a timetable for Noonan's potential return.
"I'm sure that has something to do with it," Reighard said when asked if the emotional toll of losing Noonan factored in to his athletes' performance on Sunday. "But great athletes have to learn to let that lie. And I think we're going to learn to let that lie because she won't be back for an extended period of time, if she comes back.
"I think everybody was concerned when you don't have your national qualifier on beam. And I think the mistake we made today is more than one person felt she had to make up for her not being in the lineup and unfortunately in our sport you can't score 10.3, you can't get more than a 10, you can't be better than you are and when you try to do that it gets reckless. And I saw reckless beam today."
While Moraw won the beam, only one - Preslee Harrald (9.750) -- of the Chippewas' other five competitors in the rotation scored better than 9.5.
"It was tough losing Taylor," Moraw said. "That was a tough practice on Friday. But you know what, we're here, we have got her back, we're going to do it for her. Now it's time to come out with a vengeance and get the scores we really need.
"We've had this happen where girls have been hurt right before a meet. It's definitely tough. Coming in you want to do it for them. They can't physically do it. So we want to do it for her, we want to do it for her, because she's not capable of doing that.
"From a senior perspective it's definitely tough. None of us wants to see a senior get hurt especially because it's your final season, it's done after this year and it's just devastating because she works so hard and is so motivated and so focused. She'll still be all of that, but she won't be that leader-by-example for a few weeks until she's back in it. She'll be back soon. She won't let this stop her at all."
Reighard said he was pleased with the fact that the Chippewas posted four scores of 9.8 or better. Against Eau Claire, they had just two such scores.
"I think we're moving in the right direction," he said. "The frustrating thing for me was the mistakes that we made last week that we worked really hard to correct, we were good (Sunday) on those, but we let it go someplace else. The concentration for a gymnast has to be a full minute-and-a-half. That's how long a routine lasts.
"If you daydream in our sport, you're off the beam, you don't catch the bars, you have a mistake. So I think that's certainly part of what we have to re-address: You have to stay alert, you have to stay in it, for the whole minute-and-a-half, for the whole routine.
"It's not endurance, it's not strength. It's definitely a mental situation right now. We can guide them as coaches, but the athletes have to correct that."
Players Mentioned
