Although Penn finished fourth in its title defense, Molly Sullivan was named the ECAC Gymnast of the Year. The Penn gymnastics team knew it would have to put together its best performance of the year in order to be victorious at the ECAC Championships on Saturday. Unfortunately, it did not happen for the defending champion Quakers. Penn placed fourth out of seven teams at the meet with a score of 188.875. That was one of the better team efforts of the year but it was not enough. William and Mary won the championship with a score of 191.900, its second-highest team score of the year. James Madison finished second with a 191.100 and host Brown was third with a 189.000. The Bears' total was a new school record. Coach Jackie Court has led a remarkable turnaround of former Ivy League doormat Brown. While Penn and Yale have been the top Ivy teams in recent years, it was Brown which proved to be the Quakers' biggest rival this year. The Bears finished second to Penn at the Ivy Classic on February 28 at the Palestra despite defeating the Quakers in a dual meet at Brown on February 7. At their own Pizzitola Sports Center Saturday, the Bears edged out the Quakers in the teams' final meeting of '99. "Brown just squeaked by us-- we have to give them credit for a great season," Penn coach Tom Kovic said. "William and Mary and James Madison were just better teams." Trailing Penn were the two other competing Ivies -- Yale and Cornell in fifth and sixth, respectively-- and Vermont. Last year, Penn became the first Ivy team to win the ECAC Championship when the Quakers posted a team-record 190.575. This year, however, injuries made it difficult for Penn to provide a repeat performance. "Our team score could have been two to three points higher with no injuries," senior co-captain Molly Sullivan said. "We still only counted one fall at the meet, which means that we had a lot of different people come up big for us." Sullivan was named the ECAC Athlete of the Year in a vote of the coaches. The Georgia native, who had already won the individual competition at the Ivy Classic, is all but assured of a spot as an individual competitor at NCAA Regionals on April 10. "The ECAC award is the biggest honor I've received since the coaches vote for it and the coaches are great people," Sullivan said. "Winning the all-around at the Ivy Classic doesn't really say as much about how hard you've worked as this does." The Red and Blue opened the meet with a 47.875 on the beam. Sullivan and sophomore Sarah Bruscia led the way with scores of 9.775 and 9.725, respectively. Every Quaker scored at least a 9.300 in the event. Penn next competed on the floor, where it scored a 48.700 -- .100 off the school record set last year at ECACs. Junior Becky Nadler and sophomore Jenn Capasso contributed 9.800 and 9.750 points on the event, respectively. Sullivan then earned a school-record mark of 9.900 to round out Penn's impressive floor performance. The Quakers were unable to continue their high level of performance on the vault. Penn's score of 46.100 was over a point lower than all of its competitors. Nadler's 9.300 was the high mark for the Red and Blue. Penn concluded the meet on the always-interesting uneven bars. The bars were at times a major problem for the Quakers this year but Saturday's effort was above average. As usual, Penn was led in the event by freshman Sarah Tudryn, who scored a 9.650 to place third in the event overall. Sophomore Kelly Haberer, who had been one of the most inconsistent Quakers earlier this year, earned a 9.225 and was called "solid as a rock" by Kovic. Sullivan's disappointing score of 8.700 prevented her from challenging for the all-around title. The Quakers were without three important team members -- senior co-captain Shannon Stafford, junior Lizzie Jacobson and freshman Christy Paino. Jacobson has been out since the tearing her ACL at the George Washington Invite on January 23. Paino and Stafford suffered their injuries more recently. Paino was unavailable the final two weekends because of a separated shoulder, while Stafford was out with a knee injury. The injury to Stafford was especially demoralizing since she had already made a remarkable comeback from an ACL tear suffered last year. "It was really tough for me to be out after coming back," Stafford said. "I'm glad I was at least able to get back this year. We're proud that we stayed as strong as we did despite some hard times." While the season failed to end with an ECAC title, it was by no means an unsuccessful year. Penn still won the Ivy Classic and the Quakers finished with their highest-ever Regional Qualifying Score in spite of the setbacks. The team's RQS of over 189 was more than 1.5 points higher than the previous team record set last year. "We did accomplish a lot this year but the most memorable things for me were the intangible things like never quitting," Kovic said. "We always kept our eyes on our mission and that's what amateur sports is all about."
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