Redhawks drop first dual meet of season

~ Southeast earned the second-best vault score in program history.

Tom Farden watched his Southeast Missouri State gymnastics team lose its first meet this winter, but he saw three positives along the way.

First, the Redhawks posted their second-best vault score (48.900) in the program's 33-year history.

Second, the Redhawks had their best floor performance in three meets this season (48.800).

And the coach also was somewhat pleased with his team's overall score.

The Redhawks fell to Iowa 194.550-193.650 at Houck Field House on Saturday afternoon, dropping the Redhawks to 2-1 this season.

"That vault score was the second-best of all time history," Farden said. "And I'm real proud of the floor. ... They looked awesome on that."

Junior Sandra Blake placed first in both the vault and floor competitions, helping her team to its strong overall performance in both events.

Blake, who was named Midwest Independent Conference gymnast of the week after winning the individual all-around against Illinois State on Jan. 25, scored a 9.875 on the vault, which pleased Farden. She finished fourth in the all-around (38.600).

"She just technically looked really great," Farden said about Blake's vaults. "That was the best vault she's had of her career."

Added Blake about her vault performance: "It was all the team. We just built up from our first player out there who stuck it. [Overall], I think our performance was kind of rocky, but we just have to go up from there. We just need to be precise and execute all of our skills."

Rikara Turner, who came in third in the all-around (38.700), was surprised to learn her team earned its second-best vault score in school history.

"That's awesome; that's amazing," she said. "That just got us pumped."

Farden said the Redhawks struggled at times on both the bars (48.150 team score) and balance beam (47.800 team score).

"Bars, we were missing a lot of angles, but it was still a solid performance," he said. "Our first athlete came up and fell short on the first, but then the next five came up and hit and looked really great. Our balance beam, again we started off with a fall and we just really never recovered from that. We just looked a little timid, and our scores kind of reflected that. We had a fall on balance beam for the second week in a row, and that's really hurting us. We got to get the team back to hitting all routines and not falling on any event."

Blake won the floor with a 9.850, and Turner came in fourth.

Farden calls Turner and Blake the team anchors, and said when they are doing well, his team usually does well. He added that it is important for both to continue to work on some of the little aspects of the sport, like presentation and execution.

"Sandy looked good on [vault], floor and bars," he said. "On beam, she had a little bit of trouble with her series. But other than that, a pretty strong performance."

He added about Turner: "She had a good, solid meet. Nice and consistent."

The Redhawks' point total of 193.650 was up from their first meet against Kentucky (192.625), but down from their second meet against Illinois State (194.050).

"A score is everything in gymnastics," Farden said. "The average score is what gets you into NCAA qualifications. The top 36 teams based on the average score at the end of the season are the ones who get into postseason.

"It's a strong score," Farden added about the 193.650. "We need to keep hovering around that 194 range and build on that. That is kind of our benchmark. Anything below 194 is something we've got to work on to correct."

Farden would like to raise the score to 195 at some point, but said his gymnasts need to be hitting on all cylinders to reach that point.

"We're very capable of scoring a 195," Turner said. "We just need to get everything all together."