At their best

Two meets is a small sample size.

But two competitions into the season, the Patriots are moving in the right direction.

Jay County High School’s gymnastics team set eight career bests on Thursday in its 93.45-73.4 victory over Cambridge City Lincoln.

“It is pretty amazing to be honest because we’ve had a rough couple of weeks with illnesses and injuries,” said JCHS coach Jill Ranly, whose team eclipsed its season-opening score of 91.95 in its Jan. 5 win over Marion. “I was really impressed with how they were able to turn on tonight when a couple of them maybe didn’t feel the best or didn’t feel like they had the greatest workouts the last couple weeks.

“They were able to, when the pressure was on, perform.”

Karlie Bullard, who finished first in three of the four events as well as all around, set career highs in everything but balance beam.

The sophomore began the meet with an 8.525 on vault after completing a front handspring for her first vault and a half-half on her second. Her previous highest vault score was 8.425. She followed that with an 8.0 on uneven bars, before turning in another no-fall beam routine to earn a 7.425. She was third behind Lincoln’s Emily Ogle (8.525) and teammate Riley Leavell (7.95), who had her first no-fall routine of the season.

Bullard’s biggest improvement came on the floor exercise, despite a large step on her first tumbling pass. Bullard had a clean routine from there on out and scored 8.6, three-tenths higher than her previous best.

“I know Karlie was really wanting to land her full (on the first pass), because that is what she fell on (against Marion),” Ranly said. Bullard’s all around score of 32.350 was another career best and earned her a first-place finish. “I knew she was going to have way more energy and over-rotate it.”

Leavell added almost a full point on floor, scoring an 8.1 to surpass her previous best of 7.45. She had a few extra steps but nothing too detrimental.

“Riley’s score was amazing,” Ranly said. “I would assume she got points for her connections and jumps that she didn’t get last week.”

Leavell, who also posted career bests on bars (7.8) and all around (31.15), knows what she can improve on as the season progresses.

“Working on cleaning up little things such as my jumps,” the sophomore said. Leavell also scored 7.85 on vault and turned in a no-fall routine on beam to score 7.25. “I can fix a couple of my jumps, work on sticking passes and things like that.”

Freshman Rachel Louck had a career-best 8.325 on floor as she finished second to Bullard and ahead of Leavell. It was a solid close to her meet that included an 8.025 on vault, 7.175 on beam and 6.325 on bars. Her all around total of 29.85 was fourth behind Ogle’s 30.875.

Fellow freshman Paige Howell has been one of those gymnasts Ranly said was fighting an illness and hadn’t practiced in a week. She had a 7.96 on vault, 7.075 on floor, 5.95 on beam and 5.875 on bars for an all around score of 26.7.

“Just the fact that Paige was able to get out here and do it tonight was amazing,” Ranly said. “There is more to come from Paige. She is going to place (at meets). She’s got to feel good once she gets there.”

Justice Day, another freshman, competed on varsity in all four events. Her best score, 7.05, came on vault. She scored 6.55 on floor, 5.675 on beam and 3.775 on bars. She totaled 23.05 in all around.

Mariah Salinas also made her varsity debut, scoring 6.3 on vault and 3.775 on beam.

“We knew we were going to have to pull our our best routines in order to beat them,” said Ranly, whose team travels to Northwestern in Kokomo on Saturday for an invitational, “That is good because this weekend we’re going to have some good competition in our invitational.”