With just one weekend left in the 2013 season, the Utes have managed to sort out most of the issues they faced at the beginning of the year. They have overcome the inconsistency on bars that kicked off their season and have kept churning out high-scoring victories without two All-Americans Corrie Lothrop and Kailah Delaney.
But a large question mark remains, and it exists on a 4-inch-wide space elevated roughly 4 feet above the ground.
In a way, the balance beam has been a tale of two teams for Utah. The Utes posted a season-high 49.425 in the last week of the regular season against Florida but followed that performance up a week later at the Pac-12 Championships with some shaky performances, which prevented them from winning the conference crown.
Co-head coach Megan Marsden said her team was better on beam at regionals last weekend, even though its score of 48.65 didn’t reflect that sentiment.
“A couple people weren’t quite up to snuff, but I felt like four people really did a nice job, and I would say that’s better,” Marsden said. “At Pac-12s, we had most everybody with at least one pretty major break.”
Marsden said the judges’ tight scoring was also a factor in Tuscaloosa, Ala. Even though the Utes’ score was the second-lowest they had put up all year, it was second only to Alabama’s 49.2, and scores dropped as low as 48.275.
“Regionals’ beam was brutally tight, so the score does not reflect the performance that was done,” Marsden said. “Kassandra [Lopez] and Mary Beth [Lofgren] did the routines of their lives and got 9.775 and 9.825.”
Lofgren has been Utah’s most consistent beam worker with a regional qualifying score of 9.875. She earned All-Pac-12 second team honors because of her success and has saved the day for Utah on more than one occasion with clutch performances on the apparatus.
Unfortunately for the Utes, Georgia Dabritz has gone the opposite way. She stepped into her all-around role this year knowing beam was going to need some extra focus, and her routines have mirrored her team’s performances. She has scored as high as 9.9 but has also fallen on multiple occasions. She had to settle for a 9.4 at Pac-12s.
“I think moving forward is going to be the best thing,” Lofgren said after the Pac-12 Championships. “I think just moving forward and improving on that and learning from it is the best way to go. That was definitely a learning experience.”
As Utah prepares for nationals, gymnasts know a performance like the one they had against Florida would set them up nicely to advance to the Super Six, while a letdown could end their season early.
Marsden hopes last weekend’s outcome was the precursor to a bounce-back performance. While ending the meet on beam is not preferable for this team, she is looking forward to having another shot at it.
“At Pac-12s we weren’t horrible, we just weren’t as good as we would have liked to have been,” Marsden said. “We enjoyed this last week’s rotation order, but this is part of the deal. It’s a draw. We have a chance to redeem ourselves.”