DeKALB, Ill. – After winning the first Mid-American Conference Championship in school history last year by capturing the crown at the MAC Championship meet in the NIU Convocation Center, ninth-year NIU head coach Sam Morreale and his 2020 Huskies open competition this Sunday at Kent State beginning at Noon (CT).

Morreale sat down with NIUHuskies.com to preview the upcoming season.

Q: How is it different coming off a MAC Championship season as opposed to any other season you've been here?
Morreale: "It was awesome to win the championship last year. It was a culmination of a lot of hard work from that team. The difference this year is, we know we can do it, we've got that experience. We still left a lot of things undone last year, with the two big ones being winning the regular season MAC Championship, and then qualifying for NCAAs as a team. The positive is, yeah, we know we can do it, because we did it, but we're still hungry.

"That was a big concern of mine coming into the year was, we reached the top of the mountain, now are we going to back off.  I didn't see any of that. We had a great summer training, a great preseason training, and the girls came in ready to go in the fall. Overall, we felt really, really good about that.

"As far as what we did differently [to prepare], I mean, obviously, we tried to do everything the same. We had a lot of things fall into place for us last year, and on top of that, we had a very talented team that was ready to step up and get it done at the MAC Championships. So that's what we're trying to replicate."

Q: Obviously this is a new team in 2020, and you lost a group of senior leaders. Have you seen that leadership void being filled and gymnasts stepping up into that role?
Morreale: "Oh, you always worry about that when you have a quality group of seniors graduating, and it's not always about what routines they provide, it's that leadership, those intangibles, I do feel like truly that group helped prepare these next classes to fill that void. We kind of tout in our recruiting that everybody's a leader and we want a roster full of leaders. I think that has helped us in the grand scheme in that our underclassmen are trying to step into those roles, but they also know when to defer. So honestly, I was concerned about filling those leadership roles, but this group has done a really good job of taking that concern away."

Q: You have added five freshmen for 2020, what do they bring to the program and who do you see making the most impact?
Morreale: "They have brought great energy, they're all really good kids. Brookelyn Sears is a hard worker, she's somebody who reminds everybody on the team of [former Huskie gymnast] Kat Prentice, just from her look, from the way she carries herself. She brings a high level of gymnastics, she's very competitive, and she's very clean in what she does. Natalie Hamp, and I've been saying this from the beginning, she's probably one of our best bar swingers, ever. She's a kid who should be able to knock it out of the park every week. That's where she's going to make her biggest impact this first year.

"From a team standpoint, and I talked to the team about this in the offseason, the freshmen aren't coming in to save us. We're going to compete them and they're going to do a job, and they're going to fill a role, but we've got a a great group of 14 returners that could have competed for a MAC championship without freshman. The fact that they're pushing for lineup spots only makes our depth better."

Q: How competitive has it been on the four events for line-up spots going into this first meet?
Morreale: "It has been very competitive throughout the fall and as we came out of Christmas break, it has only increased. I'm still not 100 percent certain [what the line-up will be on Sunday]. I have to turn in a lineup, but I'm not 100 percent certain because of the competition. That has only helped us and is going to push us. The hard part is everyone understanding that even if you can go 9.8 but can't make the competitive lineup, your 9.8 is still necessary because it's making everybody else go 9.8 or better to hold their spots.

"One of the intangibles that I think the leaders from last year left us is the competitiveness is fun and good natured. It's not like 'I'm taking your spot.' And that's not what this is, these kids truly want NIU to put the best team out. If they aren't there, yeah, they're bummed about it, and they're going to work hard, but they understand it."

Q: The season is always a progression, what are you looking for out of this first meet at Kent State?
Morreale: "We have to hit the ground running. Yeah, the season is a progression, but I'm truly expecting us to go 194 and a half, if not over. We are targeting [a score of] 9.75 everywhere, and that will put us at about 195 [team score] and I do feel like we have a roster that can do that as an average. I'm looking for everybody that we put in to hit, everybody that we put in to get their start value. We talk about it in terms of hits and not necessarily chasing a score. You can control whether you hit or not, you're going to control whether you hit a start value or not, you can't control the score.

"On Sunday, I want to come out with our best effort. It's not about hey, let's just see what happens the first meet and then we'll fix that for week two. We're ready. We know we're going to do well.  Individual-wise and all-around wise, those kids need to start the year strong if they want to qualify to regionals."

Q: What are the goals for this year's team?
Morreale: "The goals for week one, are consistency, having fun, doing what we do in practice and then we should go 24 for 24 [on hit routines].  Whoever goes up, I mean, you're up because we feel like you can hit, and we feel like we should be a 194 or better team right out the gate. So that's kind of where that weekly goal is, and then we will adjust that and tweak it from there.

"We do want to be regular season champs, obviously overall. Week one gets us going right there. We want to win the conference again. So we want to be regular season and tournament champions and we want to get that elusive NCAA Regional bid as a team.

"Overall, we want to have fun. We want to keep it light, have fun and be super competitive. When we have fun, we're better."

Q: How do you feel about jumping into the MAC competition so early?
Morreale: "I like it. I truly I don't care. To me it doesn't matter. I want us to be as ready now as we are at championships. The difference at championships is we have some experience, some competitions under our belt. We just haven't had that. Other than maybe some lineup adjustments, there's not going to be any dramatic changes in what we're doing. I feel like historically we are ready early, so to get into MAC play early, I don't think hurts us I really don't.
"The good thing too is, MAC teams are good. It's going to be a quality competition. Going to Kent State is not like a little school. Three out of our first four weeks are tough MAC teams with Kent, then Western and Central."

Q: The team was picked second in the MAC by the league coaches. Your reaction?
Morreale: "Preseason rankings. It's like our NCAA ranking, I don't know what to take from it because nobody knows my roster. Nobody knows what team I'm putting out there, and I don't know their team. Being picked second is great, it's a reflection of the championship last year. I think over the last three years, I think we've been first or second every year, so in the overall scheme of where the team is going, I feel like people see us as an improving squad and a team that's trying to get in the national scene."

Q: What does the schedule look like this year?
Morreale: "We have an open weekend, but I feel it's going to come at a pretty good time for us where we can use it to our advantage. I've never had it where we have kind of an off weekend like that, so it'll be interesting. To compete in the MAC is a competition every single weekend. It's not like there are off days. People used to look at us and maybe say, it's an easy meet, you can do whatever. I don't think it's like that anymore and it's truly not like that for me looking at any of the other teams in the conference. Those six meets become hard meets. We're going to the quad meet out at George Washington, which I think will be nice. We haven't been on the East Coast in a while which is nice to kind of get out to other areas of the country, especially in a four-team meet."

Event Outlook: Vault
Morreale: "On vault, on paper, we're 90 twisters which is great, that's huge. Right now, we're not, because we're banged up, and we're going to be patient because we have 12 meets. I don't have any 10.0 (start value) vaults, but the quality of Cinny Lamberti's vault, Gabby Welch's vault and Amanda Bartemio's vault is very high. Tara Kofmehl's vault is better than it was last year, and she competed for us all year. Morgan Hooper has worked her way into vault lineup. Those are five really, really solid vaults and then we have Zoie Schroeder, who is coming back from injuries and hasn't vaulted since she was a club gymnast, but she's got one of the best twists in our gym. I feel like the depth is there once we have our line-up in place."

Event Outlook: Balance Beam
Morreale: "Balance beam, on paper, is our best event and we should go 49 plus every time out. We should be a nationally relevant team on beam because of the depth and the quality and what [Associate Head Coach] Nita [Teague] does there with that group. That's a place where we're probably 12 deep and probably through 10, we're choosing between kids that can go 9.8, and that's a great problem to have."

Event Outlook: Uneven Parallel Bars
Morreale: "Bars is similar to beam, we're super deep there. As we get more kids back from injury, we'll be even deeper. We'll put two freshmen out there.  Brookelyn Sears, the JO (Junior Olympics) group listed hers as a routine to watch going into this year, and she's not even the best freshman on bars. That should be an event that goes 49 plus. The hope is, those two events can kind of make up for the other two while we're getting healthy."

Event Outlook: Floor Exercise
Morreale: "Week to week, floor is one of our better events still. Based on how injuries hit us, we're not as deep as we were. We have six really good floor routines that are going to be as good as last year. The problem is right now, I don't have that depth. From an overall skill standpoint, floor is going to be fine. All four of our events skill-wise, when we have our best six kids in, the team on paper is better than the team last year. So that's a good thing. Now we have to get there and we have to be smart about it. I feel good about floor. I'll feel better about floor in a couple of weeks.

"I feel like bars, beam and floor, when we're rolling, all three of them will be over 49 and then vault if we can just stay competitive, we're going to be good."

-- NIU --