Nine days after a narrow home victory against North Carolina, the gymnastics team fell 0.550 points short of the Tar Heels on Sunday in Chapel Hill in the Tar Heel Invitational. George Washington, James Madison and Wisconsin-Oshkosh finished third, fourth and fifth, respectively, in the event.
Despite the team not having to count any points off for falls, coach Mark Stevenson said the team lost because of the smaller details of its routines.
“One of our goals is to have no-fall competitions. Well, we didn’t have any falls today that we counted. But in the scheme of those no-falls, we made lots of little mistakes,” Stevenson said. “Well, now that we’re hitting our routines and confident about our routines, now we need to take that next step, which means not only hit them, but hit them and do them well.”
Senior Amanda Jones scored N.C. State’s lone first-place finish, in the uneven bars, while Carolina senior Christine Robella took three wins — she was first in both the vault and the floor exercise and was the top gymnast in all-around score.
Robella said the meet came down to the Tar Heels hitting their stride a few meets into their season.
“We’ve competed now in four meets, so we’re coming up; we’re peaking. So this is just us midseason. We’re starting to get all our routines, getting more confident,” Robella said. “So we’re feeling good.”
The Wolfpack competed without freshman Taylor Seaman, who had competed in all four events during meets this season. Stevenson said she rolled her ankle in practice on Tuesday.
“It’s a low-grade sprain. It swelled up a little bit. We’re being cautious because we’ve got a long season yet to go,” Stevenson said. “And when she’s back 100 percent, then we’ll put her in and get her back in the lineup.”
Senior Rachel Katz said the loss of Seaman and her consistency hurt the team.
“She’s a solid all-arounder for us — a 9.8 on every event. So we had to replace her with people that can fill her shoes, but might have been a little more nervous to actually go out there and compete,” Katz said. “So that was a few tenths here and there that I think we lost.”
Meanwhile junior Leigha Hancock said the team needs the most improvement in its floor routine.
“In all the meets, floor probably needs the most work — myself personally too — a lot. We should work a lot more on floor,” Hancock said. “But everything else, we’re right on track.”
Katz, though, said there were little things in each event that hurt the team.
“We struggled a little bit on every event. We all had a little bobble. The team was able to pick them up, so I just think [we need to improve] the little minor details on every event, and I think that’ll be good — the stuck landings, the form, a little bit cleaner,” Katz said. “And that’ll add the tenths here and there.”
