LINCOLN, Neb. — The Utes had to bite their nails through the final rotation, since they finished on a bye Thursday night, but the lead they had built up stayed true enough that Utah qualified for tonight's Super Six team championships at the 2003 NCAA women's gymnastics finals.
The Utes moved into second place after their second event, vault, and hung on in the evening session of Thursday's preliminaries to total 196.85 and qualify second behind host Nebraska (197.325) and ahead of Georgia (196.625).
"I knew this session was going to be tough," said Utah coach Greg Marsden. "You have to be at or near your best to move on.
"The tough thing is, I don't know how we're going to field a team tomorrow," said Marsden, whose club has countless aches and injuries and now must deal with back-to-back nights of competition for the first time this season.
By draw following Thursday's sessions, Utah was chosen to begin tonight's meet on uneven bars. The meet begins at 6 p.m. MDT.
"We're pretty beat up," Marsden said. "I hope they have the adrenaline going and they're determined enough to give it a try."
Most beat up is fifth-year senior Theresa Kulikowski, who scored 9.90s on both bars and beam, the beam score cementing Utah's place in tonight's finals, unless Florida or Stanford had humongous scores on their final events as Utah sat out its bye. They did not.
Kulikowski said determinedly that she will be ready for tonight, the last team performance of her five-year Ute career.
UCLA (196.95), Alabama (196.775) and Michigan (196.125) qualified for tonight's Super Six out of Thursday's early session. Third-ranked Arizona State (194.225) finished a far fourth ahead of Louisiana State (194.000) and first-time competitor Iowa (193.825).
"There are going to be six incredibly good teams going to be on the floor tomorrow. It's going to be fun," said Nebraska coach Dan Kendig, who has been confident that his team can win its first title on its home floor at the Bob Devaney Center.
"There was a lot of pressure," Kendig said about having the meet at home, "but I really wasn't that nervous."
The 'Huskers may have lost three-event performer Tami Harris, who hit her leg on the upper bar and suffered a couple of cuts serious enough to send her to the hospital to prevent infection. Kendig said doctors were even talking about her coming back for tonight.
Georgia lost Sierra Sapunar to a torn ACL in Wednesday's warmup sessions, and the Bulldogs' season has paralleled Utah's in terms of injuries and setbacks. "We just have the same problem everybody else has. We're just holding on," said Georgia coach Suzanne Yoculan.
Thursday's meet "was fun for me because we've had an up-and-down year, we've been inconsistent," said Marsden. "I hope we've got one more in us."
Nebraska's Richelle Simpson led the second-ranked Cornhuskers' charge to the day's highest team score by winning the 2003 NCAA all-around title scoring 39.675 to nose out defending champion Jamie Dantzscher (39.65) of No. 1-ranked UCLA.
Dantzscher had the misfortune of competing in the afternoon session, when scores can be lower. In fact, Utah came within .1 of the Bruins' team score, but the results from the sessions cannot be compared.
Utah sophomore Annabeth Eberle scored 39.45 to place fourth in the all-around and pace the Utes, who qualified four people in five spots for Saturday's event finals.
Florida (196.325), Stanford (196.200) and Auburn (193.525) were eliminated by Thursday's evening-session scores. Dropping out after the afternoon session were Arizona State (194.225), Louisiana State (194.000) and Iowa (193.825).
The Utes had their problems on their opening event — floor — with a couple of stumbles and an out-of-bounds deduction. But they hit vault, their second event, so well (49.35) that it carried them through the last couple events — if they stayed in the 49+ range. They had 49.25 on bars and 49.125 on beam.
Senior Kim Allan hit a rock-solid 9.825 vault to start the Utes off, and Veronique Leclerc, Kristen Riffanacht and Eberle stuck theirs as well. Eberle and Kulikowski both credited the "stick" contests the Utes have had in the gym during practice the past few weeks.
"Kim did an awesome job on vault to start us off," said Eberle.
The Utes then went to a bye and couldn't decide later if it helped having time to calm down after the vault high or hurt to interrupt momentum. "We were so incredibly pumped up," Kulikowski recalled.
She was so nervous "I separated myself from the team. I go away and just relax and do deep breathing," she said. Before beam, she was more calm. "I just thought everyone had kind of set me up, and I didn't feel a whole lot of pressure." She was unaware that a major wobble or break by her could have kept the Utes out of tonight's team finals.
Those making their NCAA debuts for Utah were also important. Natalie Nicoloff opened beam with a strong 9.8, Riffanacht had a 9.875 vault and Dominique D'Oliveira scored 9.825 on bars. Senior Kylee Wagner, who has had a difficult season that got worse the harder she tried, made a strong contribution with 9.825s on vault and floor after resolving to relax more this week.
For UCLA, ranked No. 1 most of the season with probably the deepest, most talented team ever in NCAA women's gymnastics, qualifying was a little scarier than it had hoped when it started their last event, beam, with a fall and added a second fall later in the lineup.
"I think tomorrow (Super Six) is more pressure," said Dantzscher. I think we didn't have any doubts that we would make it. But it's a good thing we didn't peak today."
"We're right where we want to be," added coach Valorie Kondos Field.
Alabama, with only one senior, performed like veterans, said coach Sarah Patterson, even though the Tide "weren't at our best. We can be, oh, so much better tomorrow night."
Michigan was the surprise of the early session, with so many injuries it had only seven -available athletes, losing, among others, the co-all-around champion of two years ago, former Olympian Elise Ray, to chronic shoulder problems. "I have never been as proud of a team," said coach Bev Plocki. "Their skin is thick, and they have persevered through a lot."
"It's inspiring to be part of a team like that," said Michigan senior Janessa Grieco, who helped the Wolverines have their best three meets in the Big Ten, regional and first round of the NCAAs, despite the personnel losses.
E-mail: lham@desnews.com