Warsaw’s Jazzmine Brown performs her beam routine at Wawasee Tuesday night. (Photos by Nick Goralczyk)

SYRACUSE – A depleted Warsaw squad was no match for Wawasee as Kosciusko County’s only two gymnastics teams met Tuesday night. The Warriors dominated every event en route to a 96.325-73.150 victory.

While the Warriors were the better team in every event, the vault is once again where Wawasee shined. Freshman Reagan Atwood tied for first in the event with Warsaw’s Jazzmine Brown as both gymnasts recorded scores of 8.60. After that, it was all Wawasee for the event. Taylor Busse took third with an 8.40, Molly Smith had an 8.35 for fourth and Deea Coy claimed fifth with an 8.10.

Seeing Atwood at the top of each event became old hat in Tuesday’s meet. The freshman took first in all four events and, of course, was first in the all-around. Atwood was the only score on bars north of 8.00 as she recorded an 8.125. Her floor routine was impressive as well as it earned her an 8.975. Atwood scored a 9.00 on beam to highlight her night and finished with an all-around score of 34.70.

Having a freshman step in and make such a big impact right away has been a big blessing for Wawasee head coach Nika Prather.

Wawasee’s Deea Coy

“It’s wonderful, of course,” Prather said of having the talented freshman. “I think some of our upperclassmen were worried about her coming in. Worrying that she might take a lot of the attention but Reagan is such a hard worker and such a great person that it didn’t take long for her to fit in and earn the respect of the girls on this team.

“We’re thrilled to have Reagan because, right now, we don’t have a lot of girls competing in the all-around. To have her scores is really big for us right now while we get a few girls back from injury. We push our girls to be all-around gymnasts. So, to have a freshman come in and embrace that is big.”

Injuries have been and issue for Wawasee, but good depth has made up for that. Warsaw, however, has also had bad luck with injuries and does not have the depth to back it up.

Wawasee’s Reagan Atwood

The Tigers only had three girls compete in three of the events while just two competed on beam. Head coach Megan Kammerer knows the season has been rough, but the positives are still there for her team.

“We had some nice performances tonight,” Kammerer began. “Jazzmine did well, Katie (Richard) did very well. Katie got fourth in all-around, that was nice to see. She (Katie) also had a no-fall routine on beam. I was very impressed with the score Nadiya (Burritt) had on vault, that was her first time competing in the event. We saw some nice things tonight, we just have to work on getting healthy as we move forward.”

Richard’s no-fall was one of three on the night for the two teams. Atwood and Ashleigh Frecker also had no-fall routines for the Warriors. Frecker second place in the event.

Brown had her high-point on vault but would have a nice showing with her floor routine as she took second place with a score of 8.70. Frecker (7.55) and Meghan Beer (7.15) took third and fourth for Wawasee, respectively. Wawasee (3-1) will be back at home Thursday night against Lakeland. Warsaw (0-5) will travel to Marion on 2/4.

Warsaw’s Katie Richard