Fremd has title in sight

The girls state gymnastics meet is held each year to decide two things -- which team is the best in Illinois and can anyone beat Fremd's Mary Burke for the title of best all-arounder in the state.

The Vikings proved they can do both, with Burke winning her third all-around championship in her four years, and the team clinching the state title for the third time in the last four years Friday at Palatine.

Fremd has 149.975 points followed by Stevenson with 147.4 points and Warren with 146.9 for third-place Warren.

Fremd is 2.575 points ahead of Stevenson and virtually impossible to catch in tonight's event finals, which begin at 6:45 p.m.

Warren is 3.9 points behind Fremd, but just .5 behind Stevenson. However, overtaking Stevenson might be a difficult task as Warren has just four chances to improve its score Saturday while Stevenson has just three. Fremd has seven state finalists.

"We have a tremendous group of kids," said Fremd coach Jim Guest. "I just think they were hungry to prove they were going to do well."

This will be the 13th state team title for the Vikings, by far the most in the state. What makes it still exciting?

"Bottom line, I just like helping kids," Guest said. "I'm competitive. I want to see them do well individually and as a team"

Palatine graduated three all-arounders and were unable to repeat last year's finish, but Pirates' coach Terry Theobald wasn't disappointed with his teams' sixth-place, 144.75-point finish.

"We had a rough start this afternoon but we came back a ton," Theobald said. "We had an injury (to Nicole Barba). I brought up Alyssia Alden. She's real good on beam and real good on floor."

Palatine had a goal of its own coming into the meet.

"We came in seventh," he said. "We were trying to move up a spot. That was the goal. They did great. We're a 145 team.

"We got as much as we could with our team. We started the season at 135. One forty-five at the end is not bad."