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Gymnastics' team set for busy weekend

Following a disappointing loss to Stanford on Friday, the Arizona gymnastics' team returns home this weekend to host the San Jose State Spartans tomorrow at McKale Center.

After losing to the 11th-ranked Cardinal and remaining winless in the Pacific 10 Conference, Arizona will try to eliminate the problems that have plagued the team before facing another Pac-10 opponent.

"We want to improve our consistency," head coach Bill Ryden said. "Individual scores are not as important as the level of consistency we attain."

Arizona will then travel to Colorado on Sunday where it will compete in a tri-meet against No. 18 University of Denver (4-1) and No. 7 University of Minnesota (1-2).

Ryden said the more difficult of the two meets will be the University of Denver. Fatigue could also be a factor, as the Wildcats (2-2 overall, 0-2 Pac-10) will compete against the Pioneers of Denver and the Gophers of Minnesota just 36 hours after the San Jose State(0-1) meet.

"Denver and Minnesota will be harder, not because they are so highly ranked, but due to recovery time," Ryden said. "We may have to juggle the lineup because we don't have the turnaround time we're used to."

The Wildcats will look to sophomore Randi Liljenquist, freshman Nikki Beyschau and senior All-American Heidi Hornbeek for strong performances in all four events. Hornbeek missed last week's meet against Stanford due to injury, but will return this weekend.

Liljenquist and Beyschau each had impressive showings in the Stanford meet. Liljenquist earned the first all-around title of her career, scoring a career-high of 38.825 in the four events. She also set a season-high 9.725 on the bars, ended up third on the beam with a season-high 9.8 and finished third on the floor with a 9.75.

In the second meet of her collegiate career, Beyschau scored career-highs on the floor (9.7), the beam (9.3) and the bars (9.9), which earned her first place honors. Beyschau also set a new career-high in the all-around recording a 38.525.

"We had certain land mines we needed to address and we've done that," Ryden said. "The meets this weekend will show us if we have solved our problems."