CEDAR CITY, Utah — The Flippin' Birds head to the Boise State Broncos Friday, after a strong showing at the University of Utah where the Thunderbirds nearly broke the school record on vault with a 49.225.
Junior Virginia Brownsell said the energy the team had on vault has helped the team in preparation for the trip to Boise.
“The energy helps a lot, I think that we learned how to be a better team out there. We came off of a rough floor rotation and got it together on vault and had fun out there.”
The struggles that the Thunderbirds had on floor are definitely on the minds of the team this week during workouts.
“We may have made our floor routines but we didn't hit, and we can do so much better than that. We will be working on those corrections this week and hopefully have them fixed for this weekend,” Brownsell added.
The Thunderbirds beat the Broncos during the quad meet at the Huntsman Center but Head coach Scott Bauman said the Broncos made uncharacteristic mistakes that will not be repeated.
“We are going to see a much improved team this weekend. They really struggled at Utah. Some of their best athletes fell on events, and I know their coach, they won't be okay with that.”
The Flippin' Birds plan to continue their improvement on all four events against Boise State.
“Even though we did amazing on vault up at Utah we still can get another three to four tenths out of that vault team. Our other three events can each improve about five to six tenths as well. We're looking to improve everywhere still.”
Sophomore Tyly Bozzuto is the only gymnast on the team who has competed in the all-around for the Thunderbirds this year. She recorded her best score of the year at Utah with a 38.9, a .5 improvement from Arizona State. Sophomore Danielle Ramirez averages first or second on the team in every event but floor exercise and has not scored under a 9.8 on any event this year.
The Broncos finished second in the Mountain Rim Gymnastics Conference Championships in 2014, just ahead of the Thunderbirds who finished in third.
You can follow all the action on SUUTBIRDS.COM or on twitter, @SUUThunderbirds.
