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The gymnastics team (1-2) will be in College Park, Md. to take on the Terrapins (1-1) and the 17th ranked Pioneers (2-3) tonight at 5 p.m.
The Wolfpack is coming off a loss to Michigan and Kent State in which it posted a 191.150 after losing standout freshman Jess Panza during warm-ups. The team was led last week by sophomore Brittany Vontz and EAGL Rookie of the Week freshman Brooke Barr. Vontz lead the team on bars and all-around while Barr lead the team on vault, beam and floor posting a 9.750 on all three events.
The Pack dropped 1.525 points at Michigan from the 192.675 they posted in week one against Illinois-Chicago. According to coach Mark Stevenson, when you lose points like that in a meet you don’t post a solid score.
“You don’t [recover], that is why we lost,” coach Stevenson said. “You just don’t. Last weekend with Jess getting hurt, we took three 9.8s out of our team score and we added in three 8.8s. The bottom line is you don’t, that was 2.4 we lost from our team score, add 2.4 back and I think we are right back in the middle of that meet.”
The Pack will have to head into battle against the Terps and the Pioneers with Panza on the bench again. She will be completely out of tonight’s competition with a possible appearance on a couple events next week with a severe sprain.
“It is a pretty good sprain. It is still swollen, it’s big,” coach Stevenson said. “She is work as much as she can on it right now to get back in. I am sure she will be out this week, potentially she might get back in on maybe an event next week but I don’t think we will be up to vaulting in floor quite yet. We might get her on beam.”
The Wolfpack will have the services of sophomore Megan Rowell, though, who missed all but the first two events of her freshman season due to injury. According to coach Stevenson, the presence of Rowell will allow the team to put out a different line-up than they did at Michigan.
“We are switching things around because we are taking Megan Rowell this weekend. It will be her first opportunity for competition this year,” coach Stevenson said. “I think Megan will be doing beam and floor for us. Vaulting, we will probably stay with the same line up because we had success with that lineup even without Panza from the first meet.”
According to senior Ashley Shepard, the team will not focus on the loss going into the meet tonight. The Pack will concentrate on hitting their routines and doing their best in all of their events.
“When we were in Michigan we had an off meet,” Shepard said. “We try not to focus on that but recommit to doing good gymnastics, really push ourselves in the gym and have confidence, I think that is what we lacked in Michigan.”
The Pack, with teams like No. 19 Michigan, No. 4 Georgia, No. 13 Nebraska and No. 11 LSU on their schedule, does not go into a conference match-up with any more consideration than any other match. According to coach Stevenson, it is just like any other opponent.
“Michigan is a better team than Maryland,” coach Stevenson said. “We went head to head with them, we have Georgia coming in [and] they are four-time national champions. We treat Maryland just like we would treat anybody else.”