Boys gymnastics: Nigam, Palatine thrive on MSL stage
When Prakash Nigam first walked into the gym at Palatine, coach Scott Hagel knew he had a talented gymnast on his hands.
"He had tremendous skills for being a freshman," Hagel said. "Seeing him come in and understanding the team concept of gymnastics. That is all he has been focused on - how can the team get better?"
Nigam got pretty good along the way, too.
The senior, who is headed to West Point next year, won the Mid Suburban League all-around title for the fourth consecutive year Friday at Schaumburg, scoring a 55.50.
"Conference is nice, but I am setting my goals on sectionals and state," Nigam said. "I have never won a sectional, and state will be down to the wire. I don't want to leave my high school career without a state title."
Nigam was solid per usual. He won the floor with a 9.55, the pommel horse with a 9.35. He was second on the rings and the parallel bars and third on vault.
"I really enjoy it out here," Nigam said. "You can't be tense and you have to be prepared. You have to be ready when you go up there and hope your details come along and pull you over the edge."
Hagel is impressed with how hard his gymnast competes each and every day.
"It is an incredible feat," Hagel said. "Everything he gets he definitely deserves. He is an outstanding kid."
Nigam helped Palatine get over the edge collectively as well in leading the Pirates to the conference title with a score of 156.15.
"It is nice for the guys to see all the hard work pay off," Hagel said. "It is always great competition in our conference and always a challenge, and our guys rose to that tonight."
The Pirates got solid performances from Chris Lunsford, who was fifth in the all-around with a 51.55. Brian Gaytan and Jack Benzo also came up big for the Pirates.
Fremd was second with a season-best 152.05.
"I told our guys we just need to have a good meet," Fremd coach Tim Hamman said. "We didn't need to have a perfect meet - we needed to have a good meet."
Hamman said his team made some mistakes, but made up for those when it counted.
"We have the bobbles," Hamman said. "We had some things that didn't go our way. And we had some things go really our way, and vault was one of them."
The Vikings went 1-2 in the vault with Eric Barnd winning the event with a 9.40 and Ryan Roth scoring a 9.30.
"The vault was really good for me," said Barnd, who was third in the all-around with a 53.25. "It felt really good off the board and I stuck the landing,"
Roth also had his moment, winning the parallel bars with an impressive 9.55.
"It was a pretty good routine," said Roth, who was fourth in the all-around with a 51.90.
"The team and I weren't doing so well. But we picked things up and the team cheered me on when I was on the bars and that pulled me through."
The Vikings also got strong performance from Nick Oyasu, who was ninth in the all-around with a 46.45. Yuto Nakagawa and Ethan Cho also contributed.
Buffalo Grove finished third with a 148.60. That gave the Bison the MSL East title.
"We really wanted to use this as a tuneup for the state sectionals next week," Buffalo Grove coach Zack Crandall said. "Our goal was to break 150 and we just missed that. That being said, we still had a great meet."
The Bison got top-five finishes from Sean Sparkowski and Daniel Gerovoy. They also got help from Carlo Cirrincione, Dylan Horvath, Jack Delattre, Kyle Zyck, Jared Cihlar, Michael Trandicosta, Paulie Domian and Jesus Gonzalez.
Schaumburg finished fourth with a 145.20.
"We had a pretty good meet," Schaumburg coach Erik Bostrom said. "We had a couple of nice routines and we put some new skills in tonight. The boys were excited. It was a home meet, and there was lots of energy.
Chasen Chau supplied lots of that energy for the Saxons. He scored a 54.40 to finish second in the all-around and won both the rings with a 9.35 and the high bar with an 8.75.
"At the end of the season, I become more focused," Chau said. "Everything then starts to come together for me. That is what it was for me."
Jordan Nowlin, Sam Grzeszkowiak, Roshan Jamkatel, Brendan Warzynski, Jimmy Minard, Jacob Raeside, Dylan Ostergreen, Zeiven Nykiel, Ethan Vanderbleek and Sean Kraemer all had their scores count for the Saxons.
Hoffman Estates' William Fernandez was sixth in the all-around with a 49.30, Rolling Meadows' Ben Kowalski was seventh with a 49.10, Hersey's Matt Bednar was eighth with a 48.45 and Prospect's Jack D'Onofrio was 10th with a 45.50.