Kristen Maloney gave the Bruin faithful something to remember
her by on Sunday afternoon.
In what was the final home meet for seniors Maloney, Kisha Auld,
Christy Erickson and Christie Tedmon, Maloney put on a dazzling
encore performance at Pauley Pavilion en route to the UCLA
gymnastics team’s 197.850-196.650 victory over Florida.
Having scored a 10.0 on all events but the uneven bars at some
point in her illustrious UCLA career, the senior gymnast brought
the season-high crowd of 5,088 to its feet with a perfect score on
uneven bars, making her the first gymnast in Bruin history to score
a perfect 10 on all four events.
And she wasn’t far off of perfect in the rest of her
routines, either.
Maloney, along with freshman Tasha Schwikert, led the charge for
UCLA by posting career high all-around marks of 39.825, acting as
the main force behind the Bruins’ national season-best team
score of 197.850, a sign that Maloney says shows readiness.
“We feel pretty good,” Maloney said. “I think
we’re ready. We’re strong and confident now and
we’re ready to kick off the championship run.”
Coach Valorie Kondos Field had a different take on the
team’s current position.
“The readiness is coming slowly,” Kondos Field said.
“I was really pleased with how we did today because
we’re still making some mistakes but we’re getting
better. They are definitely improving, but if their goal is to win
a national championship, they’re not going to reach that.
They will reach it two months after the championship
meet.”
Helping to improve the outlook on the Bruins’ championship
possibilities as the regular season draws to a close was the return
of junior Kate Richardson, who two weeks ago suffered a functional
rupture of the ulnar collateral ligament to her right thumb and was
held out of competition until Sunday’s meet.
In her first event back, Richardson posted a near-perfect score
of 9.975 on the beam, inciting the lively crowd to a roar and
dispelling any worries about her ability to compete.
“It felt weird having this giant plastic brace on,”
Richardson said, “so that was annoying, but because it
doesn’t move it doesn’t hurt at all.”
Richardson, who will be unable to compete on the uneven bars for
the remainder of the season and will require surgery after its
completion, went on to score an impressive 9.925 on the floor
exercise and said it was probable that she would return to vault in
the coming weeks.
Sophomore Lori Winn, who Kondos Field hoped would be able to
compensate for Richardson’s limited competition, was unable
to post a counting score for her team as she had troubles on vault,
bars and beam.
“It’s OK in this sport to make a mistake,
that’s why it is difficult,” Kondos Field said.
“However, you need to be able to get your composure and not
make mistakes through the rest of the routine. Those are things
that we still need to work on that frustrate me.”