Junior Emily Petkun posed to begin the last of her appearances, the floor routine, entirely focused on the task at hand. Just one rotation earlier, Petkun had executed an uncharacteristically shaky beam performance.
However, in the couple of minutes it took to complete her performance, everyone forgot about the balance beam.
Petkun captivated the judges, winning the floor event with a score of 9.675 as the Quakers crushed opponents Rhode Island, West Chester and Wilson in their home opener Saturday. Penn's 189.875 points were followed by Rhode Island (181.500), West Chester (179.125) and Wilson (170.625).
"I had a little bit of a rough beam day," said Petkun, who won both the floor event and the all-around individual competition. "I didn't do my best on beam so I really wanted to come back strong on floor. I just went really hard for everything and it worked out well for me."
The Red and Blue swept the opposing squads, earning points to strengthen its lead with each rotation. Penn's domination stretched across all events; the gymnasts swept the top five spots in both the beam and bar events. Senior Alexandra Chalat and junior Laura Duros took the second and third place spots for the floor event. Duros also placed first on beam, where she scored a 9.750.
The competition marked the first home appearance of freshman Stephanie Ortiz, one of three freshman on the Red and Blue who transitioned from club or high school gymnastics to college-level competition this past fall.
The transition "was a hard adjustment at first," Ortiz said, "but the team is absolutely amazing. I had a rough start to the season. I was having trouble with bars, but they just kept cheering me on."
With the help of her teammates Ortiz faced these difficulties head on. Her troubles on the bars did not appear Saturday as she earned first place with a score of 9.675.
"The one thing that really stands out about this squad is that they are tremendously competitive," coach Tom Kovic said.
Saturday's performance marked a significant improvement since the Quakers' first appearance of 2005 at the George Washington University Invitational Tournament on Jan. 16, in which Penn placed fourth of seven teams.
"Everything came together so we definitely made that transition from just getting started to getting ready to compete," Petkun said.
"Back at GW we weren't quite as prepared as we could have been or should have been on bars and that is my responsibility," Kovic said. "The team worked very effectively last week in training and preparation for today's competition and they really turned it around. I'm really proud of them."
The Quakers will have a chance to redeem themselves against one of their opponents from the GW Invitational -- Temple -- who they are set to face on Feb. 5.
Temple "is a very good team," Kovic said. "We saw them at the GW invitational and I'd say that we are very evenly matched. It should be a great competition."
Despite Temple's abilities, the Quakers are confident in their progress. "If we do anything close to what we did today I don't think we will have any problems beating them at all," Petkun said.
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