February 1, 2017 at 4:15 p.m.
Rhinelander gymnasts fall to Medford by .225 points
Rhinelander gymnasts fall to Medford by .225 points
When Rhinelander High School traveled to Medford for a crucial Great Northern Conference small division gymnastics matchup on Tuesday night (Jan. 31), one event separated the winner and loser.
The two top teams in the division went toe-to-toe, with each team winning two events, but the Lady Hodags faltered in one particular event and it was the difference in a 114.750-114.525 loss.
Rhinelander took first, second and fourth place in individual all-around scores, but the balance beam is the apparatus that decided the meet.
Medford earned a team score of 27.4, while the Lady Hodags managed only a 24.95, not a huge margin, but enough to decide a meet between evenly matched teams.
"We really had some solid scores," Rhinelander co-head coach Heather Sturtevant said. "We beat them by quite a bit on bars and floor. On bars, we third, second, fourth and fifth. We really just dominated that. But beam, we had to take fours and fives and they threw up all sixes, with one seven."
Raven Sturtevant won the event for Rhinelander with a score of 7.45, and Stephanie Kuester placed fourth with a 6.9, but no other performer earned more than a 5.4, while all six Medford gymnasts earned at least a 6.6.
The beam has been the one pitfall for the Lady Hodags all season, and it got them again.
Luckily, Kuester performed well, winning the all-around with a score of 30.85, despite having just one day of practice in the past two weeks.
"The good news is that we did have Stephanie Kuester back and she won the all-around and she only had one day of practice and she's been out for two weeks," Sturtevant said. "Her sister, Makayla, competed in two weeks and she only had one day of practice. We tried to really work beam hard, but we just couldn't do it."
Rhinelander won the floor exercise 30.5-29.875 and the bars 27.475-25.45, but fell in the vault by a slim score, 32.025-31.65.
Raven Sturtevant finished second in the all-around with a score of 30.15, while Alyssa Mitchell placed fourth with a score of 26.525.
A win for Rhinelander would have put it in the driver's seat to win the GNC with just one more dual meet and the conference tournament ahead.
A tough loss in a big meet is always tough, and it didn't take long for the Lady Hodags to get back to work.
"This is just one of those things that just proves that gymnastics is an individual sport, but in a way, it is a team sport," Sturtevant said.
"It doesn't take one person. We were going through routines on the way home. There were lots of little things. It wasn't just one person that fell, a bunch of us did."
Rhinelander still has a shot at the GNC title, with a dual meet against Chequamegon on Feb. 16 and the conference tournament on Feb. 18.
So, in the two weeks leading up to those meets, the Lady Hodags will go back to the drawing board on the beam.
"We're definitely going to be going back to some basics," Sturtevant said. "Going through multiple no-fall routines, really practicing the things that we're falling on - we shouldn't be falling on mounts - and some of those things and really hitting it systematically."
Nick Sabato may be reached at [email protected] or via Twitter @SabatoNick.
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