Penn places fourth at T.S.I.

At Sunday's Towson State Invitational, Penn's gymnasts tied a school record for team score on their way to a fourth-place finish. Towson State, with an Invitational record-high team score of 193.950, took first place. George Washington took second with a 190.825 score, and Maryland followed closely with a score of 189.450. The Quakers took a distant fourth with 185.900. Fifth and sixth places were claimed by William and Mary (184.875) and Temple (184.625), respectively. Although the fourth-place finish might seem dismal, but the Red and Blue improved greatly from the past few years in which they consistently finished in last place. The other teams have an advantage in that Penn was the only school at the competition which does not offer athletic scholarships. In their defeat of William and Mary, the Quakers greatly improved their chances of advancing past the Eastern College Athletic Conference Championships to the NCAA Regionals because they will face the Tribe again in the ECACs. The meet was highlighted for Penn by personal bests from Carin Kaplan's 9.150 on the bars and Shannon Stafford and Kathleen Gunn on the vault, scoring 9.375 and 9.650 respectively. As Penn tri-captain Lori Taylor said, Towson was "a good time for the bests" because the whole team is still expecting their peak to come this weekend in the Ivy Classic. From the beginning of the competition, the gymnasts faced an uphill battle. They came to Maryland expecting to end the competition with the beam. Penn was surprised, however, because an additional team resulted in changing the order of the rotation. Instead, the Quakers began with the beam and ended on the bars. "We have a resilient team," Penn coach Tom Kovic said. "Others would have panicked, but because we are self-assured, we went in and got the job done." The Quakers pulled together and had their highest event score on the beams. Getting off to a good start was the push that the Red and Blue needed to compete with these tougher teams. The key to their fourth-place finish was consistency. According to Penn tri-captain Kathleen Gunn, "we always had made routines which were not necessarily the toughest," but better than having to count falls in their team scores. "The atmosphere was hectic and confusing which made it hard to get focused," said Taylor. "It was good for the team to prepare for the Ivies." The invitational format tested the stamina of the gymnasts in preparation for this weekend. The atmosphere and speed of the competition forced the team to focus, but the team responded by hitting almost all of their routines. Because of some minor injuries, some Quakers didn't compete in all of their usual events, but even without their top lineup, the team tied their record-high score.