Neuqua Valley edges Geneva
Neuqua Valley needed everything it got from Emily Jacobs, Sarah Cushing, Shaniah Lim, Isis Ruff and Riley Wypiszenski.
The Wildcats used the efforts of everyone in their lineup to nip Geneva by the slimmest of margins, 138.50-138.45, while Lake Park scored a 134.6 during Wednesday’s Upstate Eight Conference girls gymnastics triangular in Roselle.
“We’ve been incrementally improving each meet so we’re very happy that we came up with another two points,” Neuqua Valley first-year coach Jo Ann Pschigoda said. “We still have some work to do, but it was nice to see what they did tonight.”
Jacobs, only a freshman, led the way for the Wildcats, won the all-around with a 35.7. Sara Cushing was right behind her, finishing with a 35.55 and also winning bars with a fantastic effort of a 9.4.
“I just got my handstands in my routine and definitely have worked hard on it in practice,” Cushing said. “It went very well today.”
While the contributions from Jacobs and Cushing were significant, so too were Wypiszenski’s 8.7 on beam and 8.5 on vault and Ruff’s 8.5 on both bars and floor.
“Last year we didn’t have enough people to battle for (a conference title),” Cushing said. “We think we have a shot if we keep working at our skills and it should be a great season.”
Geneva, which set a school record with a 142.125 when it last visited Lake Park for the UEC meet in January, just fell short of victory despite Ashley Puff scoring a 35.4 and Delaney Wood posting a 34.5 in the all-around.
“We’re disappointed we didn’t win, but we raised our score from last night and it’s so difficult going back-to-back,” Geneva coach Kim Hostman said. “We just hope to keep progressing and improve our team score. We’re improving on each apparatus and just looking for more consistency and a 138.45 is a decent score.”
Puff tied for first place on beam with an 8.8, while teammate Jenna Ginsberg won the vault with a 9.0.
“Jenna has really stepped up and we need someone strong to vault and her tsuk is real nice now,” Hostman said. “It’s been nice to see and we’ll hopefully get Kate (Kanarowski) back on full strength to do all-around.”
Kanarowski’s top effort was a second-place finish on bars with an 8.9 while Haley Carroll had a 9 on floor and Alexis Graham finished with an 8.5 on vault.
Lake Park junior Jessica Lewis had an unforgettable effort on floor to finish things for the host Lancers. Lewis won the floor with a personal-best 9.5.
“When I got done I felt pretty good,” she said. “I had a 9.4 last year, but tonight I was a lot cleaner than I had been and I’ve now added a new jump and music.”
Kayla Goodwin led the Lancers with an all-around score of 34.3, while Lewis added a 34.1 for the Lancers.
“We’ve been sticking around this 134 score,” Lake Park coach Jake Luketin said. “It’ll be interesting to see what we can do once we get healthy.”