Bad breaks as Geneva loses Leonard to injury
It was a good news, bad news Monday for the Geneva girls gymnastics team.
The good news: Geneva broke its season-high score.
The bad news: Sonya Leonard broke her ankles.
On the upside, the Vikings were able to regroup and overcome the loss of Leonard to blow past their previous season-high score of 133.525 and register a 135.525. While their new season-high wasn't enough to upend Neuqua Valley (138.5), the Vikings did finish ahead of Waubonsie Valley (133.55) and Andrew (125.9) to take second place.
On the downside, Geneva saw the high school career of one of its seniors come to a painful, screeching halt during pre-meet warmups when Leonard fractured her right ankle and broke her left ankle.
"Overall I thought they had a great meet," Geneva coach Kim Hostman said. "It was really hard to go into it after what happened to Sonya, because she's a senior and been so awesome to the program, but that being said, they all stepped forward and did their part."
Leonard's absence seemingly inspired fellow senior Shannon Vigna, who had a career afternoon. The most notable moments occurred on beam, where she took second place with a 9.15 and on vault, which she closed with and tied for third with yet another 9.15.
"This was my first meet that I've competed my dismount with a twist (on beam)," Vigna said. "It's really exciting that I stuck the routine and landed the dismount."
While big hugs from Hostman and her teammates confirmed that she did very well, she still had to wait for the judge's ruling to see if she'd capture her first score of 9 or higher.
"I knew it could be a 9, but I wasn't sure," Vigna said. "I'm so used to falling on some trick so to finish it off and get my first 9 was really exciting."
And then she went ahead and took home her second career score in the 9s on vault.
"Shannon had an outstanding day," Hostman said. "She recently added that full of on beam and that obviously helped her score and confidence tremendously."
With Leonard out of the lineup, the Vikings had to do some scrambling, and it made freshman Kaitlyn Kanarowski's performance all the more important. Competing as Geneva's lone all-arounder, Kanarowski tied for third on bars (8.5) and took third in the floor exercise (8.9). Meanwhile, teammate and specialist Emily Ott won the floor exercise with a 9.1.
Ott, a sophomore who was competing for only the third time of the season, wasn't on the team last year and recently had been sidelined with an illness.
"The team got off to a nice start and that made me more nervous," said Ott, who rooted on her team during its bars and beam routines. "I fell on my first pass in the last meet so I was worried about that, but once I got past it I felt pretty good."
Geneva is back at it again tonight, with Senior Recognition against Oswego Co-Op. in Mack Olson Gym. Action begins at 6 p.m.