Utah gymnastics eyes ways to improve after encouraging start

After months of projections and estimates, Utah’s gymnastics team finally has a baseline. The good news is the starting point is a solid one.

The Utes, who participate in Saturday’s Best of the State against SUU, BYU and Utah State at the Maverik Center, opened the season Friday with a 196.425-195.35 win over Kentucky.

In watching film of the effort, Utah coach Tom Farden saw plenty of good things from his young team to build on.

“We are really pleased in terms that things could have gone a different direction and it didn’t go that way,” he said. “Early on they have shown they have some fight in them and I am pleased with that.”

Utah’s score wasn’t close to the 197 range it was in for most of the 2019 season, but it was still the fourth-highest opening score in the country with the Utes scoring 49 or higher on all events.

The rough spot that could have turned the meet in a downward direction was bars where Cristal Isa fell and freshman Maile O’Keefe stumbled to a 9.6. Instead of continuing the slide, seniors Missy Reinstadtler got a 9.825 and Kim Tessen closed out the rotation with a 9.925 for a team score of 49.

“Overall I was pleased,” Farden said. "We need to work to tighten some things up before our next meet but we think a lot of our mistakes are correctable and we can squeeze those tenths out of the routines.”

Farden predicted beam was going to be a good event for the Utes this year and it was a solid 49.1 on Friday, but what stood out to him was the 49.125 on the vault.

“We looked really good and we will add another 10.0 vault hopefully this weekend,” he said. “We didn’t seem to lack endurance on floor so that is encouraging too.”

Farden said he wants the team to make some improvement overall in the coming weeks as the Utes continue to experiment with routines.

“We still need to work on positioning in lineups and we have some athletes on the cusp of breaking into the lineup so that’s kind of fun,” he said. “With the newness of this team we are going to keep making changes for the first couple of months."

It’s doubtful the Utes will have freshman Jillian Hoffman in the lineup for another two weeks as she continues to nurse a strained foot. Farden is hopeful she can compete at least on the bars against Arizona State on Jan. 24.

“We are working hard to get her back,” he said. “She is an all-around great athlete who can compete on all four events for us.”