Traveling to Texas this Saturday, the Ball State University gymnastics team (1-4, 0-3 Mid-American Conference) will compete against coach Lisa Simonton's alma mater.
At Texas Women's University Simonton was a four year captain and competed in the NCAA Division II national gymnastics championships every year from 1986-90.
"It's a great opportunity to go back to my alma mater and see my mentor, but we have a job to do and we are focused," Simonton said.
Simonton believes the Cardinals can't overlook the Pioneers (5-3) because they are a Division II team.
"They are a good team that scores well," Simonton said. "We just have to go down there and do what we have to do. I feel confident going to Texas that if we hit our routines we can score 48.000 in every event. That would give us a score over 190, which we haven't done yet this season."
In the team's last competition, Ball State lost at Bowling Green State University. Senior Kelly Watson won her second straight all-around competition, and only in the last two meets has Watson competed in all four events. In Ball State's first three competitions, Watson did not perform on the uneven parallel bars. Simonton said Watson will most likely perform in all four events on Saturday.
"It's still up in the air, but besides injury or sickness she will continue to compete in all four," Simonton said.
In addition to Watson's good performances recently, senior Jenna Tarkington has been performing well on the vault, winning the exercise in the last two competitions with scores of 9.775 and 9.850 respectively.
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