No. 20 Boise State gymnastics took on No. 16 Southern Utah Thunderbirds on Saturday, Feb. 27 and walked away with an upset along with a few event championships.
Boise State scored a win with their final Mountain West Conference meet of the year, making them 6-2 thus far in the season.
The Broncos beat the Thunderbirds 196.775-195.825, a point difference of .950.
This victory was one of the more meaningful for the team this season due to spectators being allowed inside ExtraMile Arena after not being able to for almost a year.
The Broncos started out on the vault with Samantha Smith and Courtney Blackson. They led the Broncos 9.875 with their first event. Smith and Blackson tied for second on the vault.
The Broncos led the ThunderBirds after the first rotation with a score of 49.275 with Smith leading the team. The beam was the only event that Boise State did not win. With that said, Smith was only off by a quarter (.25) with Morgan Aldaro of Southern Utah winning with a score of 9.900.
Photo by Mackenzie Hudson | The Arbiter
On the uneven parallel bars, Gabriela Cavina led the Broncos with a 9.900. The Broncos took the lead in this event with Cavina coming in first and Emily Lopez coming in second.
For the second to last event, the beam, Adriana Popp was the top scorer with a 9.900 and Lopez coming in third with a 9.850.
The last event of the night was on the floor, where Popp tied for first with Southern Utah’s Rachel Smith both with a score of 9.925.
A goal for the Broncos was to score at least 49’s in every category, and the team did just that and more. The Broncos had many firsts throughout the meet .
Multiple women, including Blackson, Smith and Lopez scored career highs during this meet. Hope Masiado tied her career-high score.
The career highs all come from the same event: the vault. A few other career highs came from the same individuals in different categories; Lopez performed a career high on the beam while Blackson and Smith had career bests on the floor.
Boise State gymnastics has been lights out on the floor this year and continues to look forward to defeating a few more teams this season.
On Sunday, March 2, the Broncos travel to Washington for a tri-meet against University of Washington and Stanford University.
The team was not available for comment.
