Girls gymnastics: Lake Park hits season high at Straus invite; Mundelein’s Ede takes all-around title
After a long break for the holiday season, 12 girls gymnastics teams competed in their first big meet of the new year Saturday night at the Straus Invitational in Lake Forest.
It was super close going into the final rotation as the top five teams were only separated by 1.75 points. But New Trier took home first place with 142.2 points to edge runner-up Prairie Ridge (141.8), the host Scouts (140.45), and fourth-place Lake Park with a season-high 140.45 points.
Both fifth-place Carmel Catholic (139.92), and sixth-place Warren (138.95) posted season-high scores followed by Wheaton Co-op (137.55) in seventh, Lake Zurich (135.55) in eighth, and Mundelein (134.2) in ninth.
Mundelein junior Lexie Ede captured the all-around title with a career-high 38.0 points (9.50 average) to edge Prairie Ridge's Thea Scheuer (37.47) in second. Lake Zurich's Mia McHugh (37.0) nipped Carmel's Alyssah Arends (36.72) for third place overall.
"She (Ede) is a hard worker in the gym, and she deserves everything that she gets, she really works for it and she earns it," said first-year Mundelein coach Daniella Strauss. "She's a great teammate too, she supports everyone, and I would say her floor routine was her best event today with really good landings."
After not competing last year, Ede is happy to be back on the high school gymnastics scene this season. She posted winning marks of 9.65 on beam and 9.6 on floor. Arends (9.6) took second on beam.
"Just putting together all four events," was the key to winning the all-around crown said Ede. "There's still some things I need to work on and I still want to add some upgrades, and I want to go out and have fun with my teammates."
The Lancers' strong performance was led by all-arounder Elena Heath (11th overall), who tied for seventh with teammate Carmen Tekien (9.1) on balance beam. Lake Park's beam also featured an 8.95 from Mikayla Springer, and an 8.9 from Maddie Springer. Bella Ciccia hit an 8.95 for Lake Park on floor.
"That's about a 3-point jump from (Wednesday). The girls put the work in on bars, and that bar lineup came together better today than it has all year," said Lake Park coach Jake Luketin, whose team scored 34.5 points on bars. "It was a team effort to reach that benchmark of 140 points."
Besides Arends, the Corsairs got a 13th from Karina Gamalski, and a 16th from Hollyn Krogman in the all-around.
"There was a lot of good stuff going on. We try to get every tenth out of every routine we can," said Carmel coach Sarah Mikrut Doyle. "I'm really proud of her (Arends). She knows skill-wise she's going to have to carry us on every event, and she inspires the rest of the team to do the same thing with her intensity."
Wheaton co-op's Kara Wilkinson placed 10th in the all-around followed by Warren's Evy Haggerty in 12th, and Conant's Marissa Shulman in 14th. Warren's Nora Werner (9.55) placed second on uneven bars while teammate Emilia Montes (9.5) placed third on beam.
"I was very proud of them. We've been trying to work on skills and put together a good all-around meet," said Warren coach Mary Kovac. "We're going to work on upgrading our skills, and we had a great beam rotation today."