The first month of Utah’s season is over.
The No. 5 Red Rocks defeated BYU 196.325-195.325 on Friday night in Provo, completing their stretch of three meets in eight days.
To start 2025, Utah has had its fair share of triumphs and learning moments.
On Friday night? Utah head coach Carly Dockendorf was impressed with her team’s conditioning.
“Three meets in [eight] days is a lot,” Dockendorf said. “I felt like they did a really good job of bringing energy today. I definitely was wondering what it was going to look like on the day of our third meet, and I thought that he did an excellent job just bringing in good focus, good energy, good attitude.
“I feel like the quality of their gymnastics tonight was excellent, and so it just shows ... where they’re at.”
Grace McCallum and Makenna Smith split the all-around title.
McCallum won on bars, balance beam and floor. Smith finished the best score on vault, continuing a hot streak that started in Utah’s win in the Best of Utah meet on Monday.
“I thought our meet was great tonight,” McCallum said. “I think everybody did a beautiful job. We’re really making slow, steady progress. I know the scores didn’t necessarily reflect that, but that’s out of our control. I think we should walk away from this meet feeling really proud of what we put out there on the floor today.”
Smith added that Utah’s team chemistry has been impressive through the first month of the season. That was evident when the McCallum and Smith were announced as the all-round winners.
They embraced each other and laughed once they were awarded the title.
“I love that this year,” Smith said of her team’s chemistry. “It’s super nice. The only thing I can think of to change is just keep nicking away at our little things and help us be better competitors out there.
While Friday was another high for the Red Rocks, there have been challenging moments in the first quarter of 2025. Star freshman Avery Neff went down with two severe ankle sprains against Iowa State last week.
(Chris Samuels | The Salt Lake Tribune) Utah’s Makenna Smith reacts after competing on floor during a college gymnastics meet against BYU, Utah State and Southern Utah in West Valley City, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025.
It’s unclear if she’ll return this season.
Scoring has been inconsistent. Deductions have been hard to measure.
But, as echoed by Dockendorf, Utah is only focusing on what it can control. That’s led to more consistency down the stretch.
“I think the consistency of this team is what I really, really love right now,” she said.
“We definitely have some deductions that we need to work on and get back into the gym. We obviously haven’t really had any time to train in the last week, so it’ll be good to get back into the gym. I think there are some common mistakes that we’re making that we’re going to need to start working on and ironing out in practice.”
Before the Red Rocks get back in the gym, they’re looking forward to some much-needed rest.
Their next meet is against West Virginia and Florida on Sunday, Feb. 2 in Morgantown, West Virginia.
“I think [we’ll be] taking some much needed rest time and getting ready for West Virginia next week,” McCallum said. “We’ll really focus on our recovery, taking advantage of that and prepping ourselves the best we can, with low impact for next meet.”
Smith added: “I personally am just going to rot on my couch on Sunday.”
