Boys gymnastics: Glenbard West looks ready to end state drought
It's been 20 years since Glenbard West won its only boys gymnastics state championship.
Now might be the time for another.
The Hilltoppers appear ready to battle for their second title after winning Friday's Glenbard West sectional convincingly with a state-best 153.4 points.
The only other team to score a 153 or higher this season is Niles West.
Interestingly, Glenbard West had its best meet of the season with former coach Steve Kafka in the stands watching. Kafka was at the helm when the team won its title in 1996. That 1996 team scored a 159.75 and dominated the state finals. Perhaps this is the year for the 2016 team to do the same?
"It's really incredible because we've been improving our scores every time for the past three or four meets," Glenbard West senior specialist Michael Yangas said. "Even today we didn't have our best meet, but we jumped from a 151 to a 153. Our goal is to get to 155 and to win a state title, so that's what we're focusing on now."
It was a dominating performance by the Hilltoppers. They posted the highest team score on all six events.
Timmy Le took second in the all-around and fellow junior Matthew Ideler placed fourth to lead the winners. Le also was the floor and vault champion.
Glenbard West senior Paul Bonokollie, who tied for second on pommel horse, said he didn't expect the team to do as well as it did.
"It wasn't what I expected, but we did put in a lot of work to do this," he said. "To score the highest in the state says a lot, but we're cutting it close with Niles West and the others so we need to work on improving a tenth by a tenth and we can do that for state."
Another senior, Gunnar Maddock, won still rings for the Hilltoppers.
"I can't tell you how great this feels to win an event at sectionals," he said. "I wanted to score well especially since I slipped up pretty hard at conference and my score didn't even count for the team. I'm not sure what happened, but I had the right mindset here and wanted to score high for the team."
Willowbrook sophomore Adam Sousa, who was icing his back afterward, won the all-around as well as pommel horse and high bar. The Warriors took fourth place as a team with a season-best 139.
"As an underdog team that no one thought would get in the top 5, this was a good finish for our team," Sousa said. "The wear and tear is catching up to me, but I'm fighting through it and doing whatever I can to keep it going for another week."
Downers Grove North edged Lyons, 145.9 to 145.5 to be the runner-up.
The Trojans have the second-highest at-large score and the top four at-large scores will advance to state but there are two sectionals remaining Saturday.
Sophomore Lukas Elisha led the Trojans, placing third in the all-around with a 50.55 He also tied for first place on parallel bars.
West Chicago junior Jacob Kurian, an individual representative for the Wildcats, took fifth in the all-around with a 48.95 and third on high bar to advance to state.
York sophomore John Gill tied for second on still rings to also qualify for state.
There were no qualifiers from Glenbard East (134.5), Glenbard South (126.1), Glenbard North (123.4) and Addison Trail (121.05).