March 28, 2008

BOISE, Idaho - Utah State gymnastics takes a lot of confidence and momentum into the Western Athletic Conference Championship, held Saturday at 6 p.m. at Taco Bell Arena, hosted by Boise State as the Aggies have posted their four best scores of the season in the last four meets.

Fans can follow all of the Western Athletic Conference Gymnastics Championships as the WAC, in conjunction with its Web site partner JumpTV Sports, has announced it will stream all four events simultaneously of the 2008 WAC Gymnastics Championships. Viewers can sign up by visiting www.WAC.tv.

Viewers will be able to select which event they want to watch as there will be streams available for the vault, uneven parallel bars, balance beam and floor exercise. The meet can be viewed for a subscription price of $10.95 that will include access to all four streams (only one viewable at a time) and on-demand viewing of any of the events beginning the next day.

Live stats for the WAC gymnastics championships will be available at www.utahstateaggies.com, the official site of Utah State Athletics, by clicking on the "live stats" link on the schedule/results. A list of events should show up, including the WAC championships.

This is USU's third appearance in the WAC Championships as the Aggies have only been members of the league for three years, joining in 2006. Utah State finished fourth at the 2006 WAC Championships, which the Aggies hosted, and fifth in last season's conference meet, hosted by Southern Utah at Cedar City, Utah.

USU has a 5-14 overall ledger after going 2-6 in WAC action. In its home and regular-season finale, USU lost to No. 28 Southern Utah, 195.075-193.150, Friday.

"We had to try and put this all in perspective because our whole goal was to get into the top 36," USU head coach Ray Corn said. "By having a great meet, the highest we could finish is at best 37th, so mathematically we are completely out of regionals. So for the rest of the Aggie squad, except for those individuals who could still qualify for regionals, this is the last meet of the year. It (not making regionals as a team) has only happened to us five of the 31 years, but we've got to suck it up and try to figure out what happened this year."

The Aggies are currently ranked No. 40 in the Troester rankings and the top 36 advance to the NCAA Regionals. USU has a team total 193.200 RQS.

"The whole thing about the conference meet is to stand up on the podium, who's going to win gold, who's going to win silver and who's going to win bronze," Corn said. "With that in mind, collectively if we do well individually, we will do well as a team. All I want them to do is not only compete to their potential, but exceed it."

Utah State ranks fifth in the WAC and eighth in the North Central region. The Aggies are third in the conference and eighth in the region on floor with a 48.760 RQS, as well as a 48.645 on vault (fourth in WAC, seventh in region), 48.450 on bars (fifth in WAC, eighth in region) and 47.755 on beam (sixth in WAC, eighth in region).

"For us, it's not guaranteed the end of the season because we still have some individuals who can go to regionals but if you're looking down the road, our performance at the WAC Championships will be a great kick off going into next season," Corn said.

Individually, freshman Nicole Simoneau has the second-best score in the WAC on bars this season with a 9.900, while fellow freshman Jasmine Minion also has the second-best score in the conference with a 9.875 on vault. Minion also is tied for the second-highest score in the league on floor with a 9.900, one of seven postings of that score this season including senior teammate Megan Tschida.

On the season, Simoneau's 9.845 RQS on bars ranks her fourth in WAC and sixth in the region. Fellow freshman, Jasmine Minion has vaulted up the rankings and is second in the conference and ninth in the region on vault with a 9.840 RQS, as well as a 9.835 RQS on floor which is good for fourth in the league and tied for 10th in the region. Sophomore Heather Heinrich leads USU on beam with a 9.700 RQS, ranking 19th in the WAC. In the all-around, junior Nicki Felley is eighth in the conference and 16th in the region with a 38.520 RQS.

Other top 10 WAC rankings include senior Megan Tschida's 9.825 RQS on floor, good for fifth in the conference, while Heinrich is eighth in the league on vault with a 9.795 RQS and 10th in the all-around with an RQS of 38.275.