After losing their first meet of the season to Baylor, Oregon acrobatics and tumbling lost to the No. 4 Quinnipiac Bobcats and beat the No.6 Gannon Golden Knights in Sunday’s tri-meet. On their home court at Matthew Knight Arena, the Ducks finished the day with 272.23 points, while the Bobcats and Golden Knights had 274.585 and 271.93, respectively.
The Ducks are now 3-2 on the season with two meets left. While they held a lead going into the team event, a season-low score of 90.53 dashed the team’s shot at a sweep of the meet. A trio of falls were the chief culprit, knocking 4.5 points off the Ducks’ score.
“We just had a couple busts,” Ducks head coach Keenyn Won said. “It’s just about building confidence, drilling it in so that we don’t have something like this happen again for the rest of the season.”
Oregon has performed well in the compulsory event this year, but they struggled on Sunday. While their mark of 37.70 put them just behind the Bobcats’ 37.80, it fell more than a point below the Ducks’ season average of 38.717. The event has proven to be a key component of the team’s success, as the Ducks are now 0-2 in meets where they’ve lost the opening event, but 3-0 after winning it.
They bounced back in the acrobatics event, besting both teams with a mark of 29.35. The Ducks went on to win two of the event’s three heats.
The Bobcats jumped back on top before halftime in the subsequent pyramid event, however, with a score of 29.45 to the Ducks’ 28.80. Once again, Oregon’s score was below-average compared to the team’s efforts thus far in the season.
Out of the break, the Ducks barely lost the Toss event, their 28.85 coming just short of Quinnipiac’s 28.90. Still, they sat just behind the Bobcats’ event total of 125.30 at 124.70 — well within striking distance.
The penultimate event, tumbling, was where the Ducks made their move. After winning four of the six heats, Oregon took a narrow 181.70 to 180.625 lead over Quinnipiac with a season-high 57.00 points in the event. Senior Taylor Galvin shined with an impressive 9.85 in the six-element heat, an event she’s dominated during her run at Oregon.
While disappointed with the loss, Won noted that her team has proven their ability to nail key events in practice. It’s been translating that success to meet day that has sometimes stymied the Ducks. With just two meets left in the season, the team will get a chance to even the score with No.1 Baylor. For her part, Won is looking forward to having another shot against longtime the program’s longtime rival.
“We didn’t have our best meet against them. We definitely let them have that win in terms of our execution,” Won said. “We’ve just really gotta focus on execution and showing up.”
The Ducks will travel to Hawai’i to face the HPU Sharks on March 26th, before closing out the regular season again Baylor at home on April 8th.
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