Wolves snap up crown

Prairie Ridge’s Rachael Underwood approaches the vault at the Schaumberg Regional on Monday at Schaumburg High School. Underwood won the all-around. (Daniel J. Murphy – dmurphy@shawmedia.com )

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SCHAUMBURG – Prairie Ridge senior gymnast Nikki Novak has an idea what practices will be like in the upcoming week.

“We’re going to be doing a lot of beam routines,” Novak said.

The Wolves, who combine athletes from Cary-Grove, Crystal Lake Central, Crystal Lake Central and Prairie Ridge, won the Schaumburg Regional with their season-best score of 147.350. While they were happy to take home another plaque, they also wondered how high their score could have been had three of their competitors not fallen on balance beam.

“I started thinking before beam that we were 15 for 15,” Prairie Ridge coach Lee Battaglia said. “We had not had a mistake in three events. Those falls were huge.”

For this week, they had little effect on the team outcome, since Schaumburg was second with 135.825. At next Tuesday’s Lake Park Sectional, however, the Wolves will want every point they can get to earn a team berth to the IHSA State Meet Feb. 17 and 18 at Palatine High School.

Although freshmen Rachael Underwood and Riley Mahoney both fell during their beam routines, they still took the top two spots in the all-around. Underwood scored 37.325 and Mahoney had 37.175. Novak was third at 36.775.

“I was off on my cat leap [on beam] and I tried to save it,” Underwood said. “It was just a fluke, I guess. Our score could be higher, but we had a great meet, that was one of our highest team scores.”

Underwood did not win an individual event, but her scores were consistent enough to edge Mahoney for the all-around. Mahoney won the vault, uneven bars and floor exercise. Prairie Ridge’s Savanna Mensching scored 9.075 to win the balance beam.

Mahoney fell after attempting a flip-flop layout step-out, a back handspring followed by a back flip.

“It was a pretty good meet except for beam,” Mahoney said. “I’m usually pretty consistent on [beam]. I think it was kind of a fluke.”

Battaglia said Mahoney missed other skills after the fall that further lowered her score.

“Riley had [all-around]. I’ve never seen her like that on the beam,” Battaglia said. “It was a nightmare. I was really surprised. That fall rocked her, the rest of her set wasn’t good.”

Battaglia was pleased with Novak’s first meet competing in all-around.

“I watered down my routines a lot,” Novak said. “I didn’t do my release on the bars or my double-pike [back flip] on floor. It was kind of a strategic thing, to just get a basic, clean routine to get through. I expect to do a harder routine and have to work really hard this week.”