If the Sacramento State gymnastics team wants to follow in its own footsteps from last season when it won the Western Athletic Conference Championships and advanced to the NCAA regional, the team will have to work hard through the winter training and fill some gaps.

Coach Kim Hughes said the team has set two main goals. The goals are simple and what anyone may expect. First, to repeat as conference champions and second, to make it to the regional again.

“Those are the two main goals we strive to have,” Hughes said.

In order to have that winning team, Hughes doesn’t look at individual scores. He looks for the team’s scores that will make the Hornets a championship team.

Hughes knows that it won’t be easy since the team consists of six seniors, three of whom are starters, and the team has been hit by injuries.

Co-captains Nicole Giao and Melissa Genovese said the coaching staff has put together a talented freshman class, that will not only fill the gaps, but also bring success to the team.

“Our recruiting filled those gaps. We got some really talented freshmen,” Giao said.

“We will hold our own,” Genovese said. “It will be a different year with so many underclassmen.”

Before the season started, the gymnastics team was without junior Amber Basgall and senior Courtney Hilber, but two weeks ago, the No. 1 bars competitor, junior Alexis Tsurumoto, fractured her fingers. Tsurumoto underwent surgery and will miss the beginning of the season, Hughes said. Hughes was expecting to have Tsurumoto as a key competitor on the bars.

“It’s tough to take,” he said.

As last season’s champs, the Hornets would like to repeat, but in order to do so, Hughes said the team will have to work on the difficulty level.

“(We will have) to work on using the same level of difficulty and bring (the new) people up to that level,” he said.

The Hornets have a group of eight freshmen who will need to step up earlier than previous years, due to the loss of key performers.

“We are asking them to step up,” Hughes said.

He added that some freshmen are prepared for the change, but others may need a little more time.

The freshmen aren’t the only gymnasts that the team will be relying on. The returning class will also have to step up.Hughes said co-captains Giao and Genovese are two of the best gymnasts Sac State has on the squad.

“They can compete on all four events,” he said.

Others to look for are sophomore Marina Borisova and junior Tiffany Bass, who are potential all-around gymnasts.

Hughes said that gymnastics is a year-round sport, but the team has less than a month before competition starts.

Genovese said winter training has entailed a lot of conditioning to build up their skills.

Sac State competed in an intersquad meet Saturday, which was used “to get our feet wet,” Genovese said Thursday.

The Hornets did more than get their feet wet, according to Hughes.

“The question was to see if they can compete as well as they trained, and we were pleasantly surprised,” he said. “Some showed they can compete better than they train.”

Six of the eight freshmen preformed during the intersquad meet.

Hughes said that the Hornets should be on pace to be the team to beat and defend the WAC title.

“We are more prepared early on, (but we’ll) have to maintain that to be as strong,” he said.

The Hornets will open their season on Jan. 7 against Utah State/Wisconsin-La Crosse at 1 p.m.

Karyn Gilbert can be reached at [email protected]