Complete Results

DENTON, Texas -- The defending USAG national champions needed a rally on vault in the final rotation to get into the 2010 team finals and crowned five All-Americans on a successful day one of the 2010 USAG Collegiate Nationals on Thursday evening at Texas Woman's University. The scores will all be reset heading into Friday evening's 8:15 p.m. ET start of team finals. The Big Red ended the evening with a 191.675, just barely outpointing Temple for the second and final spot in the second session. In all, four teams will compete for the title.

The Big Red will crown at least one All-American in all four events, with the individual finals on Saturday. Emily Santoro on vault, Gabriella Sanguineti and Maddie Pearsall on bars, Melanie Standridge on beam and Emily Lenk on floor will all compete for individual national titles.

The Big Red will compete against the host school, as well as Rutgers and Bridgeport in Friday's finals.

Below are some of assistant coach Melanie Dilliplane's thoughts on the day one session.

We started out on bars. First up was junior Danielle Scott, who had a stellar routine that opened with her uprise Franzella followed by a freehip - overshoot handstand - toe shoot to the high bar and then finished up with an uprise - double tuck that had a couple of steps but overall was pretty good for a 9.275. Next up was freshman Sarah Hein. Unfortunately she missed her opening release move (geinger), but came back with a superb finish. She did a freehip - giant 1/1 - overshoot handstand combo and ended with a beautiful full in dismount to score a 9.100. Third up was sophomore Bethany Neczypor who hit a fantastic hop handstand - straddle back but missed her connection of toe shoot to the high bar but kept swinging and finished off with a free hip - giant 1/1 - double tuck dismount for a 9.150. Junior Maddie Pearsall was next and she had our first big score of the day.  She opened her routine with a toe shoot to the high bar and then swung a giant 1/1 - giant 1/2 - overshoot handstand combo that was flawless and ended her routine with a giant 1/1 - double tuck for a 9.700.  Senior Molly Parker stepped up fifth. She had a beautiful uprise - healy - straddle back handstand combo followed by a nice higgins - yaeger and ended with a beautiful toe front dismount for a 9.650. Up last, but not least, was junior Gaby Sanguineti, who wowed the judges with an amazing giant 1/1 - geinger - overshoot combo  and then backed it up with a solid giant 1/1 - double tuck that she stuck and they rewarded her with a 9.775! 

 

WIth only a point from first -last, we knew this would be the nail biter we had expected..... on to beam.

 

First up was Danielle Scott who nailed her entire routine which consisted of a switch leap - straddle jump 1/4 and an aerial round off - beat jump followed by her side aerial - side aerial series and ended with her gainer pike dismount to score a 9.575. Next up was junior Kim O'Donnell. She opened with her back handspring - layout series which she fell on but followed that with a super switch leap - wolf jump 1/1 and a back tuck - tuck jump 1/1  and finished with a  stuck front tuck 1/1 dismount for a 9.000.  Bethany Neczypor was up 3rd.  She hit a beautiful triple series - 2 back handsprings to a layout then made her switch leap - tuck jump 1/1 - beat jump combo and added a back tuck and a front handspring in and finished her routine off with a front layout 1/1 dismount for a 9.625.  Senior Sarah Zelek was up next and started with a nice switch leap - tour jete - beat jump combo followed by her back handspring - layout series.  She also did a beat jump - double stag ring jump and finished with a round off - 1 1/2 dismount but unfortunately fell and scored an 8.900.  5th up in our lineup was senior Brittany Howse.  She opened up with a beautiful switch leap - gainer layout followed by her back handspring layout series.  She then did her switch side leap and a beat jump - straddle jump 3/4 combo before she finished off with a solid front 1/1 dismount for a 9.625.  And our high score of the day came from sophomore Melanie Standridge, who once again wowed the judges with her amazing routine. She started off with her signature front aerial - back layout series followed by a switch leap - 1 arm back handspring.  Then she did a beat jump - split jump 3/4 followed by a back pike - split jump and for good measure finished off with a 1 arm back handspring - 1 1/2 dismount to score a 9.775 (which was the highest score of the session!).  

 

We knew that floor and vault would be crucial if we wanted to make it into finals and pass Temple, who was in second place, and still had bars and beam to go. So we headed off to floor.

 

First up was Sarah Hein, who was solid as a rock. She opened up her routine with a beautiful 2 1/2 twist followed by a nice switch ring leap - tour jete ring dance combo. Her second pass was a nice whip - 2/1 twist and she finished off her routine with a rudi (front 1 1/2 twist) for a 9.600. Next up, for only her 2nd time in the floor lineup, was Melanie Standridge. She opened up her routine with a nice rudi followed by a front layout 1/1 - front layout.  She added a beautiful 1 1/2 turn w/ her leg at horizontal - split jump 1/1 dance combo and then finished off her routine with a back 1 1/2 twist for a 9.425.  Third up was senior Emily Lenk, who had our high score of the day!  Emily opened up with a super high double pike and immediately followed that with a double tuck.  Then she added a wolf jump 1 1/2 - popa (straddle jump 1/1) and ended her routine with a nice front layout 1/1 - front tuck which the judges rewarded with a 9.775.  Maddie Pearsall was up 4th and she too opened with a high double pike and then did her tour jete 1/1 - wolf jump 1/1 dance combo.  Her second pass is a whip 1/2 - front layout 1/1 - front tuck and then she finished her routine off with a whip - 2/1 twist for a 9.750.  Junior Emily Santoro was up next and opened with a beautiful front 2/1 twist but fell on the connected front tuck.  In her second pass she did a whip 1/2 - front layout and then did her dance bonus - switch ring leap - wolf jump 1/1 and ended her routine with a beautiful front layout 1/1 - front layout 1/1 for a 9.275.  Last up for the Red was Brittany Howse who opened her routine with a double tuck and then followed that up with a back 1 1/2 twist - front layout.  Her dance bonus was a tour jete 1/2 - popa and then she ended her routine with a solid front layout 1/1 - front layout for a 9.700.  It was a pretty good floor day for us, all things considered.

 

In the last rotation, Cornell was on vault, Texas was on bars, Temple on beam and W&M on floor.... 

First up for us was Gaby Sanguineti.  She stuck an amazing handspring tuck front for a 9.600.  Pretty good start, while over at beam, Temple's first kid up went 9.125.... Second for us was freshman McKenna Archer who did a nice handspring 2/1 twist for a 9.650 while Temple's second kid went 9.050..... things were looking good.  Sarah Hein stepped up and did a super yerchenko layout 1/1 for a 9.550 while over on beam their 3rd kid went 9.625.  Our fourth  was Maddie Pearsall.  She hauled down the runway and did a super high yerchenko tuck 1/2 for a 9.675 while Temple's 4th kid went 9.750.  Up next, Emily Santoro who hit a HUGE handspring 2/1 twist for a 9.700 - our highest vault score of the day to pair with Temple's kid who scored a 9.650.  Last but not least was junior Kerri Lavallee who did a beautiful yerchenko layout 1/2 to score a 9.650 while Temple's last kid went 9.700.

 

So, we made team finals!  WHEW.  That wasn't stressful at all ....WAS IT? Absolutely!  I think both Paul & I managed to get a few (more) grey hairs over this one. But, the good news is that the slate gets wiped clean and we can start fresh tomorrow. The top 4 teams that will be competing in team finals tomorrow are:

 

Cornell, Rutgers, Texas and Bridgeport

 

It will again be a very close meet - we can't afford to make any mistakes if we hope to keep our title.  We will get some sleep, good food and be ready for a great meet tomorrow.