The BG gymnastics team will head back on the road as they travel to Muncie, Ind., this weekend for their matchup against Ball State.
The Cardinals are currently 2-5 while the Falcons sit at 2-2 the Falcons will be looking for a third straight Mid-American Conference win.
For the Falcons, this will be the third road competition out of four meets to start the season and for the Cardinals the second home meet out of six competitions this year.
“Obviously we like to be able to perform well on the road because it is such a big piece of moving on to the postseason,” said head coach Kerrie Turner. “You have to account a certain number of road scores so knowing that we have had some success in are early meets away and then a great home meet last weekend”
The Falcons, since 2003, are 7-3 against Ball State and look to notch another win on Friday. BG won last year’s meet in Anderson Arena, posting a score of 194.525 to 192.775. But that does not stop them from taking their opponent seriously.
“We never want to go into a competition thinking it is going to be easy, we’ve are going to try everything we got to hit it every single time,” said sophomore Katrina Carpenter. “It does not matter who it is, if they have won all season then it is up to us … we just got to go in there with our full confidence and know that we are going to hit no matter who we are against and what their record was.”
With a BG win and a Kent State loss the Falcons would be in first place in conference standings with three wins on their resume. It would be the first time since the 2009-2010 season that BG has won three or more MAC competitions in a row.
“It’s huge for us, we have been chasing both Kent and Central the past couple years and that is something of a confidence game, so this would give such a huge amount of confidence going into our next couple meets if we can get the win this weekend,” said Turner.
Ball State looks to ruin the Falcons win streak with the help of Sarah Ebeyer and Brooke Evans who both won either gymnast or specialist of the week dating back to Jan. 8. Ball State is also looking at Katie Honarmand who looks forward to facing off against a former high school teammate who now competes with BG’s team.
“It is different, because we have always competed against each other since we were in elementary school,” Carpenter said. “Actually I have known her for a long time so it is just really weird … but at the same time I got my side and your side but I still hope the best for her when she competes.”
