Six and a half points separated the Birmingham Unified Gymnastics Team from a spot in the State tournament this year.
BU, which finished with 134.350 total team points, finished seventh at Saturday’s Regional 4 at Troy Athens High School.
Farmington (147.775), Troy Athens (145.925) and Brighton (140.975) finished in the top three, and will move on this weekend’s state final. Scoring is determined by adding together the top four scores on each event.
BU’s finish marks a three spot improvement over last year’s tenth place regional finish.
“It was a really good season for the team, we’ve improved a lot since last year,” junior Maddy Reem said.
Sophomore Elizabeth Hocking agreed.
“I would say we had a very good season,” Hocking said. “We’ve won a lot more meets than we did last year.”
This year’s Regional meet was a jumble of gymnasts -- flipping, balancing, and jumping. If a girl did well, the fans made sure to show it.
Watching the girls, the initial look of anxiety before their event – the balance beam, vault, and floor competition – was soon replaced by their relief afterwards.
Last year, the team was made up of seven girls. This year, 14 were on the team. This had a lot to do with the team’s success.
There are five girls from Seaholm, eight girls from Groves, and one girl from Lamphere on the team.
According to junior Tessa Raymond, the best part of the season for the team was the meet against Walled Lake. It was Birmingham’s first win of the season.
“We improved a lot just in that meet,” said Raymond. The team’s 134.450 fell just short of their season high of 136 – their winning mark from a tri-meet earlier in the season.
Two individuals from the team -- Justina Peterson from Lamphere and Katie Sullivan from Groves – will move on to the state meet. The rest will look back on what they’re calling a solid season and on to next year.
“Even though the team didn’t make it to States, we still did well at Regionals,” said Raymond.
