March 2, 2020 at 12:43 p.m.
Hodags take 4th at gymnastics sectionals
Hodags take 4th at gymnastics sectionals
The Hodags scored 110.775 points, well behind the second-place finish required to qualify for the WIAA state meet as a team. The team scored only one top-10 finish individually and failed to make state via the individual route as well.
Rhinelander's team score, and slim chances of qualifying for state, took a significant hit mid-week when junior Lilli Bishop, the team's top all-around scorer at the Great Northern Conference meet, sustained an injury at practice, rendering her unable to compete on Friday. The Hodags finished more than four points off their season-best score with Bishop out of the lineup.
"We had a team goal to end the season and we've really been just trying to work on personal bests anyway and just upping the team score with everybody making small adjustments, but knowing we were losing her pretty solid scores on things, we knew we weren't going to really (beat our season-high)," coach Heather Sturtevant said. "We just went back to what we had been doing - how can everyone do individually and let's see where that team score is. Can we hold on to that fourth spot? We knew we were going to be behind Ashland and Antigo and Medford, but could we still stay ahead of everybody else without Lilli and we were able to do that by still quite a few points."
The Hodags' best finish of the night came from junior Bridget Koser, who posted a career-high score of 8.35 on the floor exercise, which was good enough for ninth place overall. Koser missed qualifying for state by 0.3 points as only the top five finishers and ties qualified to compete in Wisconsin Rapids this coming weekend.
Sturtevant said Koser optimized her performance and scored about as well as she could considering the elements she has in her routine.
"With this routine, it was real solid," Sturtevant said. "She's making up in some of her jump combinations what other girls are doing in harder tumbling, which shows you can do it, you don't have to do a full twist or something to score super high. But we don't have that event requirement and we know we can up some other things to get those higher bonuses that we're not getting right now."
Another junior, Autumn Shafer, led Rhinelander in the all-around. She finished 14th overall with a score of 29.625. That score included an 8.05 on floor exercise (14th) and an 8.0 on vault (21st). Shafer was also Rhinelander's top finisher on balance beam, taking 12th overall with a 7.275.
Freshman Payton Rudawski and sophomore Abby Belbot were right behind Shafer, placing 14th and 15th on the beam.
"The girls did pretty good," Sturtevant said. "We had three falls on beam, not quite as clean as we've been in the past. Even if we didn't fall, (there were) extra body adjustments to not fall. We had some of those, but other not horrible for them."
Koser (19th, 6.45) was Rhinelander's top finisher on uneven bars as she finished 18th in the all-around (28.2). Belbot finished 20th in the all-around for 26.3.
Medford continued its strong season, winning the sectional title with a score of 134.175. That was more than six-points better than Ashland (128.05) which earned the second and final team qualifying spot, edging out Antigo by six-tenths of a point (127.45).
Washburn senior Lakyn Sonday swept all four events to take the individual all-around with a 36.525. Ashland's Catie McPherson and the Medford trio of Anna Wanke, Brooklyn Bilz and Makala Ulrich were the remaining state qualifiers in the all-around.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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