No. 20 Gym Devils take on No. 17 Wildcats in Tucson for Territorial Cup

(Photo via Samantha Maxwell/WCSN)

The 28th edition of the gymnastics Territorial Cup takes place on Thursday. Even though the meet is directly following Valentine’s Day, there is no love between Arizona and Arizona State.

The Gym Devils look to continue their head-to-head win streak as they have won the past seven meets and look to pull off an upset for the eighth. ASU head coach Jay Santos has never lost a dual meet to the Wildcats in his tenure.

For the first time since March 2020, the Wildcats enter the meet ranked above their opponents at no. 17 while the Sun Devils are ranked No. 20. Both teams enter the dual meet ranked for the first time in a decade.

Arizona is coming off back-to-back losses to Cal and UCLA on a two-meet road trip and is looking to find the winning path again at home in the McKale Center. The Wildcats have not lost at home yet this season, but they have not beaten ASU in Tucson since 2015, so one of those streaks will end on Thursday (barring the unlikely event of a tie).

Two gymnasts to look out for in the meet coming off their success at Cal are redshirt senior Malia Hargrove and junior Alysen Fears. Fears set a career-high last weekend in the bars and all-around categories and has been Arizona’s only all-around competitor since Hargrove participated on all four apparatuses in the Sprouts Farmers Market Collegiate Quad.

Hargrove is coming off tying a career-high on the vault. Last weekend at Cal, she did not compete a floor routine for the first time this year. Hargrove will match up against senior Anaya Smith from ASU, as vault is likely to provide some heavy-hitting scores.

Smith is the first gymnast of note from the Gym Devils as she looks to continue a recent hot streak on the event that she anchors. Smith has scored a 9.925, a 9.950, and a 9.900 in the last three meets and looks to break past her career record of 9.950 to provide extra firepower for the Devils.

To little surprise, all-around participants graduate Hannah Scharf and senior Jada Mangahas will be under pressure to lead Santos’s squad. Scharf made her all-around return last week and looks to reestablish her dominance alongside her younger teammate Mangahas.

Mangahas looks for revenge, as last year she had her lowest score of the year against the Wildcats, a 9.575 on bars. The senior hopes to make the first time that Arizona sees her in the all-around a memorable one.

Another gymnast to watch for ASU is senior Sarah Clark. Clark is coming off season-high performances on bars and beam in last week’s road win over Stanford. Clark scored a 9.950 on bars and a 9.925 on beam, winning event titles on both events. Her stellar outing won her Pac-12 Conference Specialist of the Week.

As with all rivalries, there is a lot at stake for both teams as they try to earn a point for their respective schools in the overall Territorial Cup competition across all sports.