RUTGERS at NEW HAMPSHIRE QUAD MEET
March 2, 2019 • 7 p.m. ET
Lundholm Gymnasium • Durham, N.H.

PISCATAWAY, N.J. – After six consecutive weeks of Big Ten meets, Rutgers gymnastics steps out of conference with a trip north to take part in a Saturday quad meet at New Hampshire with Brown and NC State. The action will start at 7 p.m. inside Lundholm Gymnasium. Live results and a video stream will be available online and @RUGymnastics will tweet scores throughout the meet.
 
RUTGERS MEET PREVIEW
The Scarlet Knights have four non-conference meets leading up the Big Ten Championships on March 23 at Penn State. The team has scored as high as 196.050, the second-highest number in program history, and owns a Regional Qualifying Score (RQS) of 194.170.
 
Posting a 194.650 at the Big Five meet last week in Ohio, Rutgers notched 194 or better for the fourth-straight competition and fifth time in six outings. The mark topped then-No. 22 Ohio State for its second Big Ten win of the season. The Scarlet Knights defeated then-No. 25 Penn State on Feb. 9 at the RAC for its other victory, owning a combined two regular season Big Ten wins in the previous four seasons. RU also leaped Michigan State in the final Big Ten regular season standings.
 
Floor exercise highlighted the last time out with a 49.000, reaching that mark for the third time this season. The event has the highest RQS to this point at 48.825. Vault owns the highest ranking at No. 40 with an RQS of 48.705.
 
Individually, sophomore Belle Huang has a team-high RQS on balance beam (9.790), floor exercise (9.835) and all-around (38.850). She is also tied with junior Kaitlyn Hall with a 9.745 vault RQS and junior Shannon Farrell paces the uneven bars group at 9.785.
 
Rutgers is set to return to New Hampshire for the first time since 2013. The Wildcats, along with NC State, are a former East Atlantic Gymnastics League opponent. The Scarlet Knights will start on balance beam before moving to floor exercise, vault and uneven bars.


COACH SALIM-BEASLEY Q&A
On the team's improvement: "I think it just show the strength of the team and that their level of determination is high. They're not going to be intimidated by names of universities or what their ranking is, but they're just going to go out and compete for themselves and hope that the scores are going to be there to showcase what they were able to accomplish."
 
On not counting falls: "I think we've done a lot with being able to keep our mental toughness and not to let little things affect our mindset and our performance. And it's something that we've practiced over and over. Yes, it is a team sport and we have to put all our scores together to get a team score, but when you're out there doing a routine, it's just you. You have to be able to keep your focus from the start to the finish so that you can get a good score to help your team. And I think they really showed a lot of confidence in what they were able to do to not let a miss affect them."
 
On the focus in practice: "It's all details. We're still losing a lot of tenths on landings and really upped the level of landings we're doing in the gym. It's not as far as landings of big skills, but we're working on just doing the breakdown of how we're landing and how we're sticking using different ways to be able to do that. Some of it is jumping off of trampolines, some of it is flipping off of blocks. Just so that we are able to come at this stuck landing in multiple ways so that any scenario that they're approaching that they'll be able to have the opportunity to stick."
 
UP NEXT
The Scarlet Knights return home to the RAC on Friday, March 8 at 7 p.m. to host a quad meet with Bridgeport, Centenary and Towson. Admission and parking are free.
 
Follow Rutgers Athletics on Facebook and Twitter (@RUAthletics) for all of the latest news and updates. For specific updates regarding women's gymnastics, follow the program on Twitter (@RUGymnastics), Facebook (/RUGymnastics), Instagram (@rutgersgymnastics) and Snapchat (rutgersgym).