BYU gymnastics falls short to No.22 Southern Utah on Friday evening at the America First Event Center in Cedar City, Utah.
The Cougars started the night off on the uneven bars. The freshman Jayda Lealaogata from Chino Valley, Arizona made her debut on the apparatus. Lealaogata started off strong with a score of 9.675. Anna Bramblett (9.900) and Lindsey Hunter (9.925) both scored a newe career high on bars. Hunter had the highest bar score of the meet, earning her first overall. Anyssa Alvarado closed out the first rotation with a 9.800.
BYU (48.975) went into the second rotation with a .75 lead over SUU (48.900).
The next apparatus for the Cougars was vault. Sophie Dudley started off with a score of 9.750. Freshman Madison Raesly-patton scored a career high of 9.800. Sydney Benson (9.875) and Rebekah Ripley (9.825) scored two new season highs. The freshman standout Kylie Eaquinto earned the highest score on vault with a 9.900. BYU closes the second rotation with a score of 49.225, a season high vault score.
With the Cougars still in the lead (48.200) over SUU (48.150), next up was floor in the third rotation. The BYU lineup included Eliza Millar with a score of 9.725. Following was Sydney Benson with 9.625, Dudley with 9.825, and Heidi Schooley to tie her career-high with 9.825. Senior Elease Rollins earned a new career-high score of 9.875. Rebekah Ripley closed off the rotation with her viral barbie routine with a 9.750.
The last rotation was beam, where BYU (147.200) gave up the lead to SUU (147.425). The Cougars have struggled with the balance beam in previous meets.
Mina Margraf had a career high score of 9.925 on beam, earning her first overall at the meet. Senior Allix Mason rounded her score to a 9.800. Followed by Raesly-Patton who also notched a new career-high score of 9.875 on the apparatus.The “beam queen” Elease Rollins closed out the final rotation with a score of 9.850.
The Cougars ended the night with a team score of 196.475, falling short to SUU with a final score of 196.925.
BYU will look to avenge themselves as SUU will travel to Provo this week. Facing off two weekends in a row, BYU will host in the Marriott Center this Friday, Feb. 10 at 7 p.m.