By Jess Westendorf
The Iowa women’s gymnastics team will host its annual Black and Gold Intrasquad at the UI Field House at 11 a.m. Saturday. Admission will be free for the event
For this meet, the Hawkeyes will split into a Black team and a Gold team to compete against one another.
The Black team will consist of seniors Lexi Mura, Ashleigh Edli, and Mollie Drenth, juniors Nikki Youd and Jori Robertson, sophomores Sydney Hogan, Rose Piorkowski, and Misty Jade Carlson, freshmen Gina Leal and Charlotte Sullivan. The Black team will be coached by assistant coach Vince Smurro.
The Gold team will consist of senior Angel Metcalf, junior Melissa Zurawski, junior Lanie Snyder, sophomore Nicole Chow, freshman Breanna Fitzke, sophomore Tessa Walsh, freshman Clair Kaji, freshman Annie Kustoff, senior Savannah Borman and sophomore Maria Ortiz. The Gold team will be coached by assistant coach Jennifer Green.
The Black and Gold Intrasquad will be the first time Hawkeye fans can see all of the five newcomers in action.
First up is Charlotte Sullivan from Christchurch, New Zealand. Sullivan is a five-time New Zealand National Champion and also won a bronze medal on the beam at the 2015 World Cup in Portugal.
Next is the Vancouver native, Clair Kaji. She is a four-time Canadian Championship qualifier and a four-time Elite Canada competitor. In the 2015 Canada Winter Games, she placed sixth in the all-around to help her team qualify for the bronze.
Breanna Fitzke is from West Allis, Wisconsin and a three-time regional qualifier as well as a two-time state qualifier. She placed finished fifth in the state on floor in 2014 and advanced to fourth in 2015.
Next up is Gina Leal from Glastonbury, Connecticut. Leal is no stranger to success — she was the state champion on vault and bars, runner-up on floor and in the all-around, the regional champion on vault and bars, as well as won vault at the Western National Championship.
The last of the 2017 newcomers is Annie Kustoff from San Antonio, Texas. In 2014, Kustoff placed first on bars and second in the all-around at the state competition. She won the bars at regionals, and the champion on beam as well as the runner-up on bars at the Western National Championship.
Looking back to last season, the Hawkeyes ended the regular season with a national ranking of No. 19, the program’s first top-20 ranking since 2011. At the end of the post-season, the team ranked No. 23 nationally for the second year in a row.
At the end of the regular season the team earned rankings of 17th on vault (48.933 average score), 17th on uneven bars (49.250), 23rd on beam (48.702), and 28th on floor (49.115).
Not only did the Hawkeyes impress in the rankings last season, but also proved worthy at the NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Championships.
Senior Mollie Drenth represented the Iowa Hawkeyes at the Championships on April 5, where she placed third on beam with a score of 9.9125. Following the season and the Championships, Drenth earned first team All-American honors. She was the first to earn the honor since Alexis Maday in 2004.
At the Championships, she recorded a 9.825 on floor and a 9.7750 on vault. Rounding things off, Drenth earned an 8.9625 on the bars. She finished 13th in the all-around with a total of 38.4750.
Drenth ended the 2016 season with 19 individual titles, including eight beam titles, seven titles in the all-around, three on vault, and one on floor. Drenth also captured Iowa’s season high scores on vault (9.950), beam (9.925), and in the all-around (39.475).
Drenth and the Iowa Hawkeyes will kick off the 2016-17 season on Jan. 8 at 1 p.m. against Northern Illinois in Dekalb, Illinios.
