Cougars power past Utah State and into second round the Salt Lake City regional – Deseret News

For the majority of the women’s college gymnastics season, scores are what matter the most. On a week-to-week basis, teams are competing against every other team in the country, rather than just the team or teams that share the competition floor with them.

Scores are what determine rankings and rankings determine postseason seeding.

Scores are the be-all-and-end-all, except not anymore.

Starting Wednesday, wins are what matter now. That is what the NCAA tournament — officially known as the NCAA women’s gymnastics championships — brings about.

And BYU gymnastics did what it needed to against Utah State, inside the Huntsman Center on the campus of the University of Utah, to secure a first-round tournament win and advance to the second round of the Salt Lake City Regional.

BYU defeated its former Mountain Rim Gymnastics Conference rival 195.950 to 194.475. The Cougars and Aggies entered the competition with an identical national ranking — No. 32 overall — but BYU was pretty far and away the better team Wednesday.

The Cougars were better score-wise on balance beam, floor exercise and on vault, and tied with the Aggies on uneven bars.

A BYU gymnast also won the event title on every event, headlined by junior Kylie Eaquinto who won at least a share of three event titles — on bars, floor and vault.

It was a thorough victory for the Cougars, even if not their best overall performance of the season.

“It’s super exciting,” Eaquinto said. “We’re excited. It feels good. We put in a lot of work this weekend, after (the Big 12 championships) to kind of clean up the little details. We had a good meet.”

It was, in a lot of ways, more of the same for BYU, which has now competed in the first round of the NCAA tournament for three straight years. In each of the last two years — including the current season — the Cougars have won their first-round meet and secured a spot in the second round.

That, head coach Guard Young said, is notable. Simply getting into the tournament is an accomplishment, let alone winning a meet and advancing to the next round.

“It’s getting harder and harder just to be in the tournament,” he said.

For Utah State, the meet marked a return to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2022. The Aggies were competitive to start the meet but an injury to freshman Olivia Orengo on vault, coupled with a previous injury suffered by sophomore Nyla Morabito, left USU too depleted to really keep pace with BYU as the meet progressed.

“Hats off to them,” Young said. “(They had a) lightning performance at their conference championship to win that. And they’re a great team. Unfortunately they had a couple key injuries that just really made it difficult for them (today). That could happen to any team.

“Gymnastics is hard. It is hard, and people go down, and it’s hard to replace kids. So my heart goes out to those players and to that team, because they were fighters. They were gritty all the way through to the end. I have a lot of respect for what those coaches did and those players did.”

Utah State’s senior class played an integral role in one of the most significant rebuilds the sport has seen recently and Aggie head coach Kristin White praised those gymnasts whose careers have now come to an end.

“Tough day today,” she said in a release. “I’m incredibly proud of our team and everything they achieved this year. We will use this experience to build next year. Thank you to our seniors. The legacy you all left has been so inspiring.”

For BYU, the meet wasn’t a clear indication of how the Cougars are capable of competing.

Sticks were hard to come by on multiple events, namely vault and bars. The highest score registered by a BYU on either event was a 9.825. Good enough to take down a hobbled Utah State, but not what the Cougars have proven capable of at times this season, as recently as the Big 12 Conference championships.

The Cougars were at or near their best Wednesday on beam, though, and actually eclipsed their national qualifying score (NQS) on that event. And despite some significant mistakes to start and end the floor rotation, BYU closed the meet strong overall with four scores of 9.8 or better on the event.

It can be argued that the Cougars are trending upward as a team and they believe Wednesday’s meet was something of a trial run for the main event on Thursday night, when they will compete inside a packed Huntsman Center against No. 4 Utah, No. 13 Stanford and Denver.

“I think it was good to kind of feel out the equipment,” Eaquinto said. “It was everyone on the team’s first first time competing in the Huntsman (Center) so we kind of got to test out the equipment. We will be ready to roll tomorrow.”

Young was no less optimistic and there is reason for that.

Just last season, the Cougars upset Oregon State in the second round of the Fayetteville Regional and were hot on the trail of Minnesota before ultimately falling short (the top two finishing teams in the second round will advance to the regional final).

Can BYU top that this year against the Utes, Cardinal and Pioneers?

“I believe we start on the balance team tomorrow. So the fact that we go to beam, we go through it, and then we’re off to the races the rest of the meet … I’m super excited,” Young said. “Those other teams are going to have to come through it when they’re a little tighter.”

And at this point in the year, it doesn’t matter what scores BYU gets when compared to its NQS or generally accepted high scores. All that matter is the Cougars beat the opposition — in this case two out of the three other teams that will be competing.

“What I love about the tournament is now the scores don’t matter,” Young said. “For 12 weeks (of the regular season) we’re competing against the SEC and the Big 10 and crazy scoring. It’s so frustrating to have great performances and then sometimes feel like we’re not getting rewarded. Now it doesn’t matter. Now it’s like, ‘Who is the best performer? Who’s going to hit the most routines? Who’s going to stick the most dismounts to advance? That’s what I love about the tournament. I think it’s great and it will be electric in here tomorrow.”