Posted: Jan. 19, 2010

The schedule had been so spare and broken up that Nicolet girls gymnastics coach Chris Dempsey didn't really know how good her defending conference champion Knights were.

Now she does, as Nicolet turned in an impressive 139.55 mark to claim the 10-team Homestead Highlander Invitational on Saturday.

"We'd been off way too long," Dempsey said, "but oh, my gosh, did we have a lot of new kids really step up."

The meet was also an encouraging step forward for first-year Highlanders coach Marisa White, whose team took a strong third with 136.925. (Sheboygan was second with 139.0.)

"This was a really great meet for us," White said. "… Overall one of our better meets of the season. We're trying to build on consistency and senior leadership from Katelyn Wright."

Nicolet was led by floor exercise champ Leah Fischer, who turned in a personal best of 9.63 in the event. She was also second in the all-around with a 36.5, fourth on beam (9.25), and third on uneven bars (8.95).

She got help from Lexi Stevens, who was fifth in the all-around (35.15), seventh on the beam (9.0), floor exercise (8.87) and on uneven bars (8.65) and eighth on vault (8.6). Other top eight finishes for the deep Knights included Alicia Berroug fourth on bars (8.72), and eighth in vault (8.64) and all-around (34.15) and Jessie Kloehn, who was fifth on vault (8.71).

"The girls did an amazing job," said an enthusiastic Dempsey. "Scoring a 139 for us right now was not where we thought we would be at this point. It is exciting and we can only improve from here."

Dempsey was enthused about the efforts of the freshman Kloehn and the sophomore Valerie Whittle.

"We really had no idea what we were going to score coming into this meet," added Dempsey. "We'd been at 135 and then 129 and now we get this. But the girls know our goals are very high. We ask them 'What do you want out of it?' and they're pretty gung-ho about it all."

For White, exact efforts were unavailable, but she did know that Cori Sandusky did an excellent job coming back from a series of injuries to turn in a 9.325 mark on bars, while Wright turned in a number of top performances including top threes in all-around, vault and floor.

White was also pleased with the efforts of Alex Holtz in floor exercise and Stephanie Fazio on the beam.

"Every girl stayed on the beam, which was a big help to us," White said.

The meet was a fundraiser for a variety of charities under the banner of the Women's Health Awareness initiative.