Minnesotan Grace McCallum sparks Utah to a victory over Gophers in women's gymnastics

Grace McCallum, a freshman from Isanti, Minn., tied for first in all-around and sparked a record-setting bars set to lead No. 4 Utah over the No. 9 Gophers 198.475 to 197.850 in a women's gymnastics meet at the Huntsman Center in Salt Lake City.

The Utes' score was a season high for them. They had three 10s, two on bars and a third on beam. The Gophers' score was their second best in program history — their best was a week earlier, 198.025 in a home win over Iowa.

But in this meet, the Gophers faced the highly motivated Utes, coming off a loss and now 10-2. McCallum went second for Utah on bars and delivered a 9.975.

"Grace set the tone with that routine," Utes coach Tom Farden was quoted as saying by the Salt Lake City Tribune. "She changed the meet."

Teammates Sage Thompson and Maile O'Keefe followed McCallum with back-to-back 10s. The Utes' team score on bars was a program-record 49.8.

O'Keefe, a junior, also had on 10 on beam.

McCallum, who won a silver medal competing for the United States in the Tokyo Olympics, had a score of 39.675 in all-around — the same as the Gophers' Ona Loper.

Senior night, in the Utes' final home meet this season, drew an announced crowd of 12,253.

"It was so much fun," Gophers coach Jenny Hansen said. "This is an environment that we were really looking forward to competing in. Utah is a perennial powerhouse and the energy and environment was fantastic.

" I am just so proud of how the team rose to the occasion. ... We do feel like everything is starting to click. The last two weeks, our beam team has been amazing and exactly as we had hoped they would be. We had some new people come in on vault and step up, so we are just really proud. We feel like we are in a great place heading into postseason."

Minnesota has only one meet left in the regular season. The Gophers host Long Island University, Temple and Utah State at 4 p.m. Saturday, March 12 at Maturi Pavilion.

Steveson favored in Big Ten meet

Steveson, the No. 1 seed at his weight, is 10-0 this season and has scored bonus points in every match. He is the defending NCAA champion as well and has been ranked No. 1 in the nation all season after wining a gold medal in the Tokyo Olympics.

Three teammates are among the top eight seeds: Jakob Bergeland is fifth at 141 pounds, Bailee O'Reilly sixth at 174 and Patrick McKee eighth at 125. If they finish at least as high as their seed, all will qualifty for the national meet.

The NCAA has awarded the conference 88 automatic qualifers for the national meet — the most of any conference — across 10 weights.

Bergeland is among six Minnesota wrestlers competing in the Big Ten meet for the first time — the most since 2016.

Among other state-raised wrestlers in the meet are Penn State's Greg Kerkvliet, a sophomore who graduated from Simley, the third seed at heavyweight, and Nebraska wrestlers Taylor Venz, a senior from Farmington, the fourth seed at 184, and Peyton Robb, a sophomore from Owatonna, the fifth seed at 157.

The Gophers football team will open two spring practices to the public, who can attend them for free. The first will be 4 p.m. April 5 and the second 11 a.m. April 16. The site of the practices will be announced later. The team's spring game will be 1 p.m. April 30 at Huntington Bank Stadium.

Randy Johnson

Gophers baseball loses

Easton Bertrand hit an inside-the-park homer and Chad Stanke hit a solo shot and also doubled and scored a run, but the Gophers baseball team lost to No. 25 West Virginia 5-4 in the Cambria College Classic at U.S. Bank Stadium.

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