(Photo: Nicholas Badders/WCSN)
On Friday, the No. 17 Gym Devils (5-2, 2-1 Pac-12) will take on the No. 2 Utah Red Rocks (6-1, 3-0 Pac-12) in Salt Lake City.
Arizona State is coming off of their second-lowest scoring meet of the season in which senior Nichelle Christopherson was injured. Sun Devil Athletics told WCSN that Christopherson is out for the foreseeable future and is week-to-week, but ASU is optimistic for her return.
ASU will have to replace Christopherson in three of the event lineups: bars, beam and floor. Possible replacements could include junior Corinne Belkoff or sophomore Averie Brook, who have not seen any action so far this season.
On the other side of the mat, Utah posted a season-high 197.700 last week and rose to the second-highest scoring squad in the nation.
ASU will look to get back on track against the best team in the Pac-12, but it will not be easy. The Gym Devils best event ranking is No. 9 on bars; whereas, the worst event ranking for Utah comes in a No. 9 on beam.
Sun Devil freshman phenom Cairo Leonard-Baker has matched up against some of the top gymnasts in the country so far, but this week she will face two of the top 5 all-around gymnasts in Utah’s sophomore MyKayla Skinner and junior MaKenna Merrell-Giles.
On paper, the Red Rocks have a heavy advantage on each apparatus and the all-around.
The Gym Devils worst event to this point is the floor exercise, where they rank 22nd nationally. This could be a particularly large problem come friday considering Utah is the best floor squad in the country, averaging a 49.480.
An event that saw early struggles for ASU is the vault, where they come in at No. 21. Although they rank outside the top-20, ASU has put up their best two scores of the season on the apparatus in the past two meets.
While the Gym Devils have been improving on vault as of late, they still rank 19 places behind Utah on the event, as the Red Rocks rank No. 2 and feature several 10.0 start value vaults. The Devils still do not have a gymnast with a 10.0 vault in their repertoire, but Leonard-Baker is working on upgrading her vault.
Earlier in the season, beam was the best event of Arizona State, but after last week’s 48.025 on the event, they dropped to No. 21 nationally. That performance; however, was uncharacteristic and they should bounce back strong in Salt Lake City.
Unfortunately for Arizona State, as earlier mentioned, despite beam being Utah’s worst event, the Red Rocks still rank No. 9 nationally with a 49.120 average score.
What has been an outstanding event all season for the Gym Devils, will need to be just that come Friday. The uneven bars have proved to be ASU’s best event as the team continues to put up individual season-bests and consistently high scores, lead by stuck dismounts and high-flying releases.
Even on the uneven bars, the Gym Devils best event, they still are not favored to win as Utah is ranked No. 3 on the apparatus.
With the odds stacked against ASU, it will look to shock the nation and earn its third Pac-12 win of the season. Catch all the action Friday night at 7 p.m. live on the Pac-12 Networks.
