Women's Gymnastics | February 4

DeKALB, Ill. – The return home was worth the wait for the Northern Illinois University gymnastics team as the Huskies celebrated their first home meet of the season with a record-breaking performance Friday night in the NIU Convocation Center. The Huskies took first place in the Tri-Meet versus Lindenwood and Wisconsin-Whitewater with a school record team score of 196.300.
 
The 196.300 mark broke the previous school record of 196.150 – set on March 11, 2017 at Central Michigan as the Huskies posted team scores of 49.000 or higher on three events in the meet. In addition to breaking the overall team score, the NIU bars squad established a new mark on that event with a 49.325 total, bettering the previous mark of 49.275 set in a home tri-meet on February 19, 2016. The Huskies finished the meet on floor exercise with a 49.350, tied for the fourth-highest all-time.
 
NIU head coach Sam Morreale was understandably excited about the team's performance.
 
"This is the team we've been talking about being all year," Morreale said. "Five meets in, we finally showed it. We talked about 'hitting'. You've got to hit what you do, and we did a good job of that, so you've got to start there. Minimizing mistakes and landing errors, that showed in our team score. We were fighting for clean landings, it was a mindset."
 
After opening the meet with a 48.625 score on vault, topped by Gabby Welch's 9.800 which took second place on the event, NIU hit the accelerator on bars. Senior Liana Roman started the rotation with a career best 9.8 and the scores only built from there with freshman Alana Anderson earning the first 9.900 score of her career. Alyssa Al-Ashari scored a 9.825, while Brookelyn Sears and Natalie Hamp closed out the bars with scores of 9.875 and 9.925, respectively, as the Huskies posted five of the top six marks on bars in the meet.
 
Al-Ashari led NIU on balance beam from her anchor position with a career best 9.900 to win that event, with Morgan Hooper adding a 9.825 and Kendall George recording the first 9.800 of her Huskie career.
 
NIU closed out the meet on floor exercise with four scores of 9.875 or higher, topped by Tara Kofmehl's 9.925 to win the event. Hooper, Anderson and fellow freshman Emmalise Nock all tied for second with their 9.875 scores. Sears, who scored a 9.8 on floor to close out her night, took the all-around title with a career-best 39.125.   
 
"We've got a great mix of young and old," Morreale said. "Our senior leadership and upperclassmen are leading us, and then the freshmen are rockstars. They're coming in and performing. This group is super talented, they're good at what they do. This success, hopefully we can build on it and keep going. We will be better than we were today and that's exciting."
 
The Huskies improved to 7-3 on the season with the win. NIU returns to the road on Friday, February 11 in the first half of a double-meet dual meet weekend for the Huskies with a home-and-home series versus Illinois State. NIU takes on the Redbirds in Normal, Illinois at 7 p.m. Friday and then plays host to ISU on Sunday, February 13 at 1 p.m.
 
Admission to all home meets is free.   
 
-- NIU --