Kernel gymnastics shows well in season-opening dual at Yankton

The Daily Republic, Mitchell, S.D.
·2 min read

Nov. 29—YANKTON — The Mitchell High School gymnastics team opened a new season on Monday night, cruising to a dual meet victory at Yankton.

The Kernels scored 143.4 points in the season opener, while the Gazelles had 127.250 at the River City Gymnastics facility.

"I feel like we went out with a lot of new skills for our first meet and we got a chance to perform those," Mitchell coach Audra Rew said. "We wanted to try everything out and I think it went exactly how we figured it would. We had some great execution and we had some falls and that's something we're OK with. We want to be aggressive competitors and do challenging routines."

Olivia Prunty was the Kernels' top all-around scorer for the competition, posting a score of 35.850, followed by Kyanna Gropper in second place (35.650) and Kyra Gropper taking third place (34.000). Kyra Gropper was the event winner on bars, logging a 9.350 score, followed by Prunty at 9.200, Kyanna Gropper in third (9.100), Emily Moody taking fourth place (8.450) and Abby Helleloid finishing fifth (8.250). On beam, Kyanna Gropper was first with a score of 9.150, followed by Prunty (9.100), Sidney Malde taking third place (8.900), and Lara Widstrom was fifth with a score of 8.700.

"Overall, I thought we looked really good and I'm eager to see how we get better as the season progresses," Rew said. "It was interesting that we had four different girls lead us in four different events. I think it says a lot about our team and it shows we have a lot of quality gymnasts on our team."

Aubree Gelderman won the floor exercise competition with a score of 9.100, with Kyra Gropper second (8.950), Malde taking third place (8.700) and Prunty tying for fourth place (8.450) with Yankton's Ava Koller.

Senior Tessa Allen won the vault event (9.150), with Prunty second (9.100), Kyanna Gropper and Lainee Forst tying for third (9.000) to comprise the top-five representatives for the Kernels.

In the JV scoring, Malde was the winning gymnast on bars (8.200), Kennedy Vilhauer won on beam (8.050), Emerson Smith was tops on floor exercise (8.800) and Ava Prunty had the meet's top vault score (8.550). Ava Prunty was the top all-around scorer in the JV events, posting a 31.800 score.

Mitchell is back in action on Saturday, Dec. 3 at the Lolly Forseth Invitational at Jefferson High School in Sioux Falls. The event starts at 11 a.m.