With the regular season at its end, the Falcons gymnastics team looks to finish Mid-American Conference play on a high note with their first post-season MAC championship title since 1985.
With the MAC championships coming up, the team has adopted a different mindset; one they hope will lift them to a victory.
“I think there is a heightened awareness and the intensity has been really high,” said head coach Kerrie Turner. “That is something we have been focused on coming out of that UCLA meet, I didn’t think … our intensity was where it needed to be. We have been trying to build, and manufacture that excitement in the gym like you would have at the meet.”
BG has had a rollercoaster ride season as they have had several winning and losing streaks throughout the course of the season. The team has dominated winning with full confidence and determination like their meet against Kent State but some meets resulted in nerves getting the best of them like in the meet at UCLA.
But in order for the Falcons to turn it around at the end of the season, they need to be focused.
“Their minds need be in the right place and the people around them really need to bring the energy to the lineup especially with the bi-rotations at MAC’s,” Turner said. “They have to come off the bi-rotations with a really high intensity and a really high level of excitement and that is what is going to keep … them confident.”
While the Falcons have posted scores in the 195’s and 194’s, against 10 of their 16 opponents, the team still seems to struggle getting wins. But the team feels well prepared this week and they are ready to fight.
“It is just making sure they follow through and finish everything … that they can’t relax for one moment in their mind and think it’s done until it is actually done,” Turner said. “This year we have gotten so much closer to teams like Central and Kent and until you can experience that you can’t really get over to the other side until you know what it feels like to be that close.”
The Falcons, who are currently 7-9 overall with a 4-2 conference record, are having one of their better seasons in recent years and feel that this could be their year to hoist the trophy they have being chasing after so long.
“I told them this we had a team meeting Tuesday night and I said we have to decide now we can’t decide on Saturday and we can’t go out there and just try,” Turner said. “You have to go in with the mentality that you are winning it … so I know they are going to give it everything and that is all I can ask is that they go out and hit their routines.”
BG will head to Ypsilanti, Mich., this Saturday to face Eastern Michigan as they strive to win a title that has for so long eluded them.
