The Red Rocks lost to Cal, but it wasn't all bad

The University of Utah’s women’s gymnastics team isn’t all that used to losing. Especially not in Pac-12 Conference competition.

It happens, sure, but year after year the Red Rocks have been the class of the conference since joining in 2012, particularly the last few years.

Saturday afternoon in Berkeley, California, Utah may have been unseated as the preeminent Pac-12 power, though, in this the final year of the conference.

In a showdown between top 5 teams — No. 3 Cal and No. 4 Utah — the Red Rocks came up short, losing to the Bears 198.100 to 197.700. Cal was the better team on multiple events — uneven bars and vault — while proving equal to Utah on floor exercise.

Cal sophomore eMjae Frazier was the best gymnast in the meet, winning the all-around title plus three other events titles — bars, floor and balance beam.

Only two Red Rocks — Ashley Glynn and Jaedyn Rucker — came away with some hardware, tying for the event title on vault with a pair of Cal gymnasts (Mya Lauzon and Kyen Mayhew).

With the loss, Utah now trails Cal in the race for the Pac-12 regular season title, a prize the Utes have claimed the last four years. And with only one more conference meet to go (at Arizona on Friday) Utah will need Cal to lose to Stanford on March 10 in order to get a share of the title.

As such, it was a disappointing outing for the Red Rocks, who expect to win conference championships — regular season and postseason — year after year.

“Not the total outcome we were hoping for today,” Utah head coach Carly Dockendorf said.

Wins and losses don’t tell the whole story in gymnastics, however, and though the Red Rocks lost, they left California in better position than when they arrived.

With the score of 197.700, Utah improved its national qualifying score (NQS) which determines rankings during the regular season and postseason seeding.

Moreover, Utah withstood the absence of two notable gymnasts — Amelie Morgan and Makenna Smith — for most of the meet and still managed to compete at or near the same level of the Bears, who are a genuine national title threat this year.

“A pretty decent road score for us,” Dockendorf said. “I love that the team fought to the very end. We didn’t give up. We definitely gave some tenths (of a point) away on our bars and our landings, and also on vault. … We made a lot of lineup changes as the meet was unfolding. We made a lineup change on three events. A lot of adjusting had to happen today and I was just proud that our team stayed focused throughout the meet.”

Defining moment

Utah lost the meet early.

As mentioned by Dockendorf, the Red Rocks left something to be desired on both bars and vault. Landings in particular were less than Utah wanted, with hops and steps the norm.

In the meantime, Cal had a standout performance on bars with three gymnasts — Frazier, Gabby Perea and Madelyn Williams — closing out the rotation with consecutive 9.975s.

It was that rotation that won the meet for the Bears. Utah outperformed Cal the second half of the competition, but the Bears’ prowess on bars, coupled with Utah’s early mistakes, proved too much for the Red Rocks to overcome.

“We definitely need to be more disciplined with our execution,” Dockendorf said.

Even with those miscues, Utah was in the competition late. That was in no small part to the team’s floor lineup.

Across the board — save for a notable poor outing from Grace McCallum — Utah was excellent on floor, counting a low score of 9.875 from Abby Paulson.

Maile O’Keefe, Ella Zirbes, Jaylene Gilstrap and Jaedyn Rucker all competed well as Utah made clear again that it is a floor team this season.

“Floor is the one event where we had the least amount of lineup changes from last year,” Dockendorf said. “I think there is a lot of confidence and experience coming into that lineup and I think our performance quality is elevated this year and it is reflecting in our scores for sure.”

Utah’s effort on floor didn’t prove enough to overcome Cal, but it put the Red Rocks in a position to win if the Bears had made mistakes and it gave Utah the boost it needed to come away with a notable road score.

Standout routines

Makenna Smith had been one of Utah’s most consistent competitors this season, but after stumbling on her vault landing, the sophomore was pulled from the lineup the rest of the night (she was slated to compete in the all-around).

It wasn’t anything too serious, Dockendorf noted. Smith’s back flared up during the week and after her struggles on vault Utah’s coaching staff decided to play things safe after it flared up again.

As a result, Camie Winger and Jaedyn Rucker both had to serve as emergency replacements and both did exceptionally well.

Rucker scored a 9.90 on floor in place of Smith, a step in the right direction for the fifth-year senior.

“I was extremely proud of Jaedyn,” Dockendorf said. “She wasn’t scheduled to be in the lineup today, but with Makenna’s back flaring up it was a last-minute change. Jaedyn has been working so hard in practice and for her to go out there and do a normal Jaedyn routine was huge tonight.”

Winger, meanwhile, was no less impressive filling in on beam.

She led off the rotation — one she has not regularly competed in — and earned a 9.850, setting the stage for a strong outing by Utah.

All as a true freshman.

“Camie loves to compete,” Dockendorf said. “That is where she thrives. … The more pressure the more she loves it. She is really a utility gymnast and what I mean by that is she can kind of go anywhere in any lineup in any space and still be able to go and perform.”

In order to capitalize on Winger’s innate traits, Dockendorf didn’t tell her she’d be competing in place of Smith until the very last moment.

“I didn’t want her thinking about it the entire meet,” Dockendorf said. “I knew that Cam would be able to handle it.”

Adjustments to make

As noted, Utah was not perfect in the meet. Bars and vault — thought solid rotations — were not up to the standard that Utah needs them to be in order to compete with the best teams in the country, which Cal is.

On bars, the miscues were primarily landing related. Gymnasts showed a lack of patience when holding landings, which led to steps forward and back. There were also rushed handstands and leg separation on transitions between the high and low bars, mistakes that can be found in any NCAA meet week after week, only Utah had too many of them.

It was a similar story on vault, with steps taken as gymnasts tried a little too hard to stick their landings. Or in the case of Smith, were hampered by injury.

Utah wasn’t perfect on floor or beam, either, with notable mistakes from McCallum and Elizabeth Ganter on floor and beam, respectively.

But it was bars and vault where the Red Rocks lost the meet and where they will need to be better going forward, particularly come the postseason.

“On bars, we left some points out there,” Dockendorf said. “Same as on vault. Absolutely if we want to contend for the national title and Pac-12 title, we are going to have to clean up some details still.

“I mentioned earlier this week that that was going to be important for us to focus on and some of the mistakes we saw tonight are mistakes we haven’t been seeing.”

The takeaway

Utah lost. Cal was the better team. But the Red Rocks were competitive on the road against a team they will likely see again a couple more times this year.

Utah improved its NQS, all while handling unexpected changes in lineups and the absence of Morgan, who remains in England for the time being while she vies for a spot on Team Great Britain for the Paris Olympics this summer.

Really, Utah proved capable of competing with an elite team while not at its best, which can only bode well for the future.

“It is going to fire them up,” Dockendorf said. “They know that we left a lot out there. Multiple lineup changes today with Amelie out and Makenna didn’t do all her events and Grace didn’t do her normal stuff today.

“Those are all excuses, which I am not going to use for our performance today, but (today) definitely is something we can think about for our potential come postseason.”