March 7, 2008

DeKALB, Ill. - The Northern Illinois women's gymnastics team looks to continue to raise its scores and build momentum in the last month of the regular season as the Huskies head to Ypsilanti, Mich. to compete in the Eagle Invitational on Saturday. Mid-American Conference defending champion Eastern Michigan will host the Noon (Central) meet, which also features Air Force and Illinois State.

The Huskies are 5-1 on the season, 3-1 in the MAC, and have won each of their last five competitions with the only loss to league front-runner Kent State in the first meet of the season on Jan. 20. Last Sunday, NIU closed out its home schedule by defeating Central Michigan and Illinois-Chicago while posting a season-best team score of 194.525. That total also ranks ninth-best all-time at Northern Illinois.

The Eagle Invitational is NIU's first meet of the season featuring more than three teams.

"It's been an interesting season," said NIU Head Coach Mark Sontag. "Every meet is something new. The quad meet presents us with a different format than we've competed in this year. The bigger meets are helpful nice because it gives us a trial run of what we will see at the MAC Championship and NCAAs where you are not always going in the same order."

By raising its team score in each of the last three meets, NIU has placed itself near the top of the MAC along with Kent State and Eastern Michigan.

"There are three teams lighting it up in the MAC right now," Sontag said. "You have us, Eastern Michigan and Kent State which are all good teams. But you really can't count anybody out, everyone has to be on top of their game. We'll also see Illinois State at this meet and they are in our region and having an excellent season."

Despite the tough competition, Sontag wants his gymnasts to continue to be focused on their performance and not who else is in the gym.

"Strangely enough my goal for the team is to keep doing what we're doing," he said. "You never know what the scoring will be like, so we're trying to do what we always do and that is have as flawless of a meet as we can. We have to control what we can control. We know that our routines are good, the gymnastics are good, and our student-athletes are confident. These are teams we haven't seen, but we train to focus on what we're doing so hopefully it won't make a difference."

Northern Illinois has been led by all-arounders Leah Johnson (Glenview, Ill./Glenbrook South HS) and Holly Reichard (Palatine, Ill. /Palatine Fremd HS) along with junior Jennifer Naughton (Smithville, Mo./Smithville HS) on the beam, vault and floor exercise. In addition, Rachel Adams (Fruitport, Mich./Fruitport HS), Natalie Blum (Homer Glen, Ill./Lockport Township HS), Jennifer Rice (Homewood, Ill./Homewood-Flossmoor HS) and Jessica Watanabe (Palatine, Ill./Palatine HS) are all multiple-event performers putting up consistent scores for the Huskies.

Following the Eagle Invitational, NIU will travel to Bowling Green, Ohio next Friday to take on Bowling Green State at 7 p.m. in the final dual meet of the season.

-- NIU --