No. 6 women's gymnasts stick No. 21 Kentucky

When the Michigan women's gymnastics team boarded a plane at Detroit Metro Airport to travel to Lexington, Ky. on Thursday, it was on a mission.

Its tasks were simple: Stay healthy, regain lost confidence and prepare for No. 2 Georgia which they face the following week. Oh yeah, and win.

On Friday night, No. 6 Michigan posted a season-best team score of 195.525 to tumble the 21st-ranked Wildcats - who tallied 189.000.

"Kentucky didn't have a very good meet," Michigan head coach Bev Plocki said.

Although the Wolverines won't come right out and say they were looking at this dual meet as a chance to prepare for an upcoming series with defending national champion Georgia, their trip to Lexington sure looked like it.

"I hope this gives us a bigger boost of confidence," Plocki said. "I'm happy to continue improving."

Today, the team is back in Ann Arbor with only a short week of practice to prepare for their next mission.

"We only have Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, so we have to make it count," Plocki said.

This is the second consecutive week the team has had a limited practice schedule. But if you were one of the 600 fans at last weekend's meet - far short of Kentucky's season average of 2,000 - you certainly wouldn't have been aware of that lack of preparation time. Michigan turned out a consummate team performance, with the help of some outstanding individual play.

The biggest standout was the Wolverines' two-time Big Ten athlete of the week, junior Sarah Cain.

"Sarah had an incredible meet. She won all four events and the all-around," Plocki said.

Cain's combined score of 39.60 was her season best. It was also good enough to secure her the honor of all-around champion for the third consecutive week.

Senior Kathy Burke, a recent model of consistency in the balance beam and the floor exercise, also rose to the occasion. She took home scores of 9.85 and 9.75, respectively, on those events. Rounding out the Wolverines' attack were junior Sarah-Elizabeth Langford and senior Lisa Simes.

Langford stuck a vault for a personal best score of 9.85. And Simes, who has been having trouble, hit a beam routine.

About the only thing that the Wolverines were surprised with on this trip was the meager turnout of the Wildcat faithful. For a gymnastics program with a history like Kentucky's, that was unusual. Nonetheless, those fans in attendance remained vocal.

With the help of a "'Cat club," as Plocki described them, the crowd led the Wildcat cheers for almost two and a half hours. The particularly long evening was because of alternating performances that kept the meet going until 10 p.m.

"It seemed like it dragged on forever," said Plocki.

Despite taking care of business in Lexington, the long and drawn out affair that it was made the Wolverines especially happy to be home- even if it is just for three days.

02-15-99