Nebraskan
Monday, March 28,1994
SPORTS
Gymnastics teams capture Big Eight titles
Season-high score
makes NU men
champions again
By Mitch Sherman
Staff Reporter
It was business as usual for the Nebraska
men’s gymnastics team Friday night at the Bob
Dcvaney Sports Center.
Inc Lornhuskcrs, 15-3,
wrapped up their 10th Big
Eight title in the last 14 years
by scoring a season-high
287.775. The score was the
fifth highest in school histo
ry
Top-ranked Nebraska
edged No. 3 Oklahoma, which
scored 286.025 points. The
Harrison nusiccrs usco strong pcrtor
manccs from senior Dennis
Harrison, juniors Richard Grace and Rick KiefTcr
and sophomore Jason Christie. Harrison cap
lured the all-around title with 57.625 points.
Iowa State finished third with a score of
261.850.
Husker coach Francis Allen said the Huskers
hit on 94 percent of their routines Friday night
by far their highest mark of the year.
“We will win the national championship if
we can do the same thing we did (Friday),”
Allen said.
But did the Huskers peak too early before the
national championships in Lincoln on April 22
23?
“We are an old team,” he said. “If we were a
young team, 1 would say yes. But this team is a
bunch of old dogs.”
That old bunch of dogs has been improving
steadily since a trip to Stanford on March 5,
when the Huskers scored a then-season-high
284.40 points.
A week later, Nebraska scored 284.55 points
in a loss to Ohio State.
And March 18, Nebraska posted 286.85
points in a road win over Iowa.
“Our improvement is keeping our momen
tum going,” Harrison said. “Each meet since
Stanford, we’ve had our best meet. So hopefully
our next two meets will be our best. If that
happens, we’ll bring home agold trophy instead
of a silver.”
Nebraska has placed second behind Stanford
at the national championships the last two
years. *
Harrison, who won the parallel bars with a
career-high 9.9, said the meet served as a
stepping stone toward the regional meet on
April 7 and the NCAA championships.
The senior from Omaha posted a season-best
all-around score, but he guaranteed that the best
was yet to come.
“I have been getting more and more consis
tent with my routines,” he said. “But this is
definitely not the best that I can do. I have a lot
more.”
As does the whole team. Harrison said.
“For sure, we ’ll score higher,” he said. “Guar
anteed. There’s definitely more this team has to
offer. We still missed routines. Those things
will come by the end of the year.”
Nebraska probably won’t be able to lop the
94 percent mark, but the overall score could still
improve, Allen said.
“We can be sharper on individual routines,”
he said. “But it doesn’t gel much better than
that.”
William Lauer/DN
Nebraska’s Martha Jenkins prepares to land during the vault competition
Saturday night. Jenkins, a junior from Kinawood, Texas, broke the
Nebraska school record by scoring a 9.875 on the vault.
Junior fill-in leads
women to victory
with all-around win
By Mitch Sherman
Staff Reporter_
With their backs to the wall, one of their top
gymnastson the sidelines and Oklahoma breath
ing down their necks, Nebraska’s women gym
nasis came mrougn m me
clutch and captured their first
Big Eight title since 1990.
The 12-5 Huskcrs scored
193.6 points, tying the sec
ond highest score in school
history, to squeak by Oklaho
ma Saturday night at the Bob
Devancy Sports Center.
The Sooncrs scored
193.275 points. They were
Hawkinson lolioweu oy Missouri witn
192.05 points and Iowa State
with 189.95.
Nebraska coach Dan Kcndig said the pres
sure the Huskcrs faced would help them at the
regional meet on April 9 in Tempo, Ariz.
“There can’t be much more pressure than
there was here,” Kcndig said. “I think we are
ready to go out and do well at regionals.”
Nebraska was paced by Jennifer Hawkinson,
who won the Big Eight all-around title for the
second consecutive year. Hawkinson, who was
competing in the all-around for the first time
this year in place of Nicole Duval, scored a
38.925 and also finished second on the balance
beam.
Duval was forced to sit out after spraining an
ankle on March 19.
Kcndig said Hawkinson filled in nicely. The
junior from Boise, Idaho, had been held out of
the all-around this year because of a problem
with her uneven bar routine, he said.
“She went out and did the job,” Kcndig said.
“She had been doing it all year in individual
events. She;just went out and came through
when we needed her in the all-around.”
Instead of risking a large deduction for miss
ing a skill on the uneven bars, Kendig said,
Hawkinson skipped that part of her routine.
“Leaving it out only cost her one-tenth of a
point,” he said. “We decided that would be
better than risking it. She still isn’t that confi
dent with that part of the routine. She hit
everything else and came out with a 9.6.”
Hawkinson’s performance leaves Kendig
with a difficult decision. He’ll have to choose
between Hawkinson and Duval, who haspaced
the team all year.
“It’s going to be lough, but I am going to go
with the best team I can put out there,” Kendig
said. “We have had the two freshmen (Kim
DcHaan and Shelly Bartlett) in the all-around
all year, along with Nicole and Joy (Taylor). But
Jennifer had a great meet.
“It will be hard, but whatever happens, it will
be for the best of the team, and the girls know
that.”
The Hunkers came out strong on Saturday by
breaking a school record with a score of 48.7 in
the floor exercise.
In the next rotation, Martha Jenkins broke a
Nebraska record by scoring a 9.875 in the vault.
Nebraska hit on five of six routines in the
uneven bars, and Bartlett broke a school record
See TITLE on 8
Volleyball players: Olympic festival tryouts to help team
By Tim Pearson
Senior Reporter
The Nebraska volleyball team’s season end
ed with a loss to Notre Dame in the NCAA
tournament Dee. 5.
But the Cornhuskers
preparations for next season
are beginning.
Six Huskers — Kelly
Aspegren, Kate Crnich,
Christy Johnson, Peggy
Meyer, Jen MeFadden and
Billie Winsett — participat
ed with 39 others in the Unit
ed Stales Olympic Festival
tryouts this weekend at the
Mct-aaaen inu couscum.
Even if she docsn’l make
the festival, Aspegren, who will be a senior in
the fall, said going through the tryouts would
help her.
“First of all, it was just a great experience to
play with other girls from around the nation,”
she said. “It docs give me an idea of where I’m
at.
“But if I make the team, it’ll be a great
experience.”
Two Huskers—Winsett and Nikki Strieker
— played in the Olympic Festival last year.
MeFadden, who will be a sophomore next
fall, was named an alternate to last year’s team.
She hopes to get more than that this time
around.
The tryouts “went really well,” MeFadden
said.
“It’s a great experience,” she said. “I felt
really good about my tryout.”
But just because she was an alternate last
year, MeFadden said, she's not a sure bet for this
year’s team.
“I’m really not sure,” she said. “I’m not just
competing with the girls at the tryout but also
competing with the other girls from the four
regions.
“If I do make it, I hope it will help me develop
and contribute more.”
Alongwiththiswcekend’stryouts, the Husk
ers are in the middle of their spring season.
Nebraska will participate in two tourna
ments this spring. The Huskcrs have already
won one tournament over Kansas and the Uni
versity of Nebraska at Omaha.
But the spring season isn’t all fun for the
players, McFadden said.
For the past three weeks, the team has been
practicing from 5:30 to 8 a.m.
“When you’re getting out of bed, it’s not the
greatest,” McFadden said. “But once it’s over
with, you can get on with the rest of your day,”
Aspegrcn said the Huskers weren’t sleeping
through their early-morning practices.
“They are pretty intense practices, and they
give us a chance to work on fundamentals,” she
said.
Aspegrcn said the additional experience of
trying out for the Olympic Festival could only
help next year’s team.
Nebraska, which had won 17 straight Big
Eight championships, will be looking to regain
the title they lost to Colorado last fall.
This fall, the Huskers will be boosted by the
return of Johnson, who redshirted this year.
Johnson, who will be a junior, will replace
Strieker as the Huskers’ setter.
“I think we’ll be great,” Aspegrcn said. “We
have five starters coming back, and the bench
got a lot of experience last season.
“We’re all working really hard, and I think
it will be a great season.”