Two Panthers wind up year at regionals

There’s always next year.

Perhaps then the Pitt gymnastics team will make it to the NCAA… There’s always next year.

Perhaps then the Pitt gymnastics team will make it to the NCAA regionals, which it didn’t do this year for the first time in four seasons.

Maybe the two freshmen who have carried the team this season will keep those high scores while they perform at regionals.

But this year, Molly Moyer and Shannon Vafiadou went without their team and only managed average scores.

“The kids who go to regionals, whether they have good results or bad results, that’s the thing they always say: They wish they were there with their team,” Pitt coach Debbie Yohman said.

“They both had great results, and next year their team better be there with them,” she said.

At Penn State on Saturday, Moyer scored a 9.675 on the floor, and Vafiadou scored an all-around score of 37.2, neither of which was a high enough score to advance.

Winning the meet was Georgia with a 197.775. Georgia, along with Denver, which scored a 195.775 for second place, will move on to the nationals.

Vafiadou’s career-high this season was 38.975, and she averaged 38.168, while Moyer’s average was a 9.688, and her top score was a 9.875.

Vafiadou was the Panthers’ main competitor in the all-around event this season and the only one for the past nine meets. Moyer was the team’s top performer on floor.

Vafiadou and Moyer earned second team All-EAGL honors this season, and Moyer was named Rookie of the Week after the Panthers’ first meet.

Yohman said one problem Vafiadou had during the NCAAs was waiting until after all of the teams had competed to perform her own routines as an individual competitor. She’s used to going early in the lineup during Pitt’s meets.

She counted two falls, one on the vault for an 8.95 and one on the beam for a 9.1. She scored relatively high on the bars with a 9.525, and she earned a 9.625 on the floor.

At the EAGL championship last weekend, she earned her career-high score on the floor with a 9.825 and tied her career-high of 9.75 on the vault.

Yohman said it was a great experience for both girls and that the team is already preparing for next season, going into the gym daily voluntarily to maintain its skills.