Cassie Thompson

Just two more points.

That is all the Blue Earth Area gymnastics team needed to overcome the New Ulm Eagles on Thursday night.

The Bucs came up with a decent score of 133.575 – their season high, but the Eagles won with a 135.30.

“It just came down to a bunch of small things we could have done a little better,” Buc head coach Sandy Oswald says. “Overall we did well, but we had a few things we could have improved on. It just wasn’t our night.”

BEA’s best event was the vault, where they swept the top four places. Cassie Thompson was first with a 9.075. Marissia Hagedorn took second with an 8.95, Blaire Zierke was third with an 8.9 and Julia Meyer was fourth with an 8.875.

That gave BEA a 35.80 score to New Ulm’s 34.55.

The Bucs also won the floor exercise, 33.65 to 33.15. Zierke took first with an 8.95 and Meyer was third with an 8.55.

Meyer was also first on the beam with a 9.0. Meyer and Zierke tied for fourth on the bars with a score of 8.25.

Meyer was also tops in the all-around scoring, with a 34.675. Zierke took third with a 34.25.

The Bucs scored a total of 32.025 on the bars, to the Eagles 33.8. On the beam, New Ulm scored 33.8 while BEA came in with 32.10.

Although it is a conference loss for the Bucs, who were conference champs last year, Oswald says it didn’t matter that much to either team.

“Martin County Area is part of the conference now, after joining with Fairmont, and they are scoring around 142,” she says. “They will top the conference this year.”

BEA third at MCA

The Blue Earth Area gymnastics team captured third place at the Martin County Area (MCA) Invitational Meet on Saturday, Jan. 16.

The Buccaneers scored a team total of 132.2. Taking first place was host MCA with a 144.575. Jackson County Central was second with 141.825.

Leading the way for the Bucs was Blaire Zierke who scored a 34.3 in all-around.

She scored an 8.9 on the vault, 8.4 on the bars, 8.2 on the beam and an 8.8 on the floor exercise.

Although she was the highest scoring BEA gymnast in all-around, Zierke did not place in the top four in any single event. Two other Bucs did.

Julia Meyer placed sixth in the uneven parallel bars, with a score of 8.675.

Cassie Thompson scored a 9.05 on the vault to also capture a sixth place finish.

Meyer gathered the second highest all-around score for the Bucs, with a 33.225 total. Thompson was third for BEA with 31.9.

Besides her score on the bars, Meyer had an 8.5 on the vault, 7.35 on the beam and 8.7 on the floor. Thompson had a 7.9 on the bars, 6.5 on the beam and 8.45 on the floor, to add to her vault score.

The Bucs travel to Mankato East on Tuesday this week.