Sooners Cruise to Victory at 10th-Ranked Michigan

Saturday, January 23

Ann Arbor, Mich.

4:00 PM

University of Oklahoma

444.400

427.850

Michigan

Sooners Cruise to Victory at 10th-Ranked Michigan

January 23, 2016 | Men's Gymnastics

By: Wes Moody

444.400

427.850

Results

Photo Gallery

Team Scores
	Oklahoma	Michigan
FX	75.900	72.800
PH	72.250	69.300
SR	73.400	70.200
VT	73.950	73.900
PB	75.800	69.700
HB	73.100	71.950
TOTAL	444.400	427.850

Event Winners
Event	Gymnast	Score
FX	Colin Van Wicklen (OU)	15.400
PH	Allan Bower (OU)	15.000
SR	Colin Van Wicklen (OU)	14.850
VT	Colin Van Wicklen (OU)	15.500
PB	Yul Moldauer (OU)	16.000
HB	Yul Moldauer (OU)	14.950
AA	Yul Moldauer (OU)	88.550

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The top-ranked Oklahoma men's gymnastics team cruised to victory Saturday night, topping 10^th-ranked Michigan 444.400-427.850 inside the Cliff Keen Arena in Ann Arbor, Mich.

Competing in front of more than 900 fans, the Sooners (5-0) once again swept the event titles with junior Colin Van Wicklen taking floor (15.400), rings (14.850), and vault (15.500), freshman Yul Moldauer winning high bar (14.950) and parallel bars (16.000) and junior Allan Bower taking the pommel horse (15.000). The Sooners swept the all-around competition as well with Moldauer taking first for the second straight week at 88.550, Van Wicklen coming is second with 87.450 and senior Kanji Oyama tying for third at 86.950.

“We started a little slow on pommel horse, so we have to fix that,” Oklahoma head coach Mark Williams said. “We got it going after that. We had a really good floor, and the rest of the way I was relatively pleased with the effort. It's a difficult arena with the crowd really pumped up for the opposing team. I thought the guys handled it well once we got going, but we have to handle pommel horse a little bit better if we expect to be a championship team.”

Just as it did at the Rocky Mountain Open a week ago, Oklahoma began its night on pommel horse. The Sooners' first event of the night was a bit shaky, with three marks under 14, but OU got strong scores from Bower, senior Josh Yee (14.900, a career high) and Oyama (14.800). The Sooners scored a 72.250 for the first rotation and after Michigan totaled 72.800 on floor, Williams' bunch trailed by just .550 heading to, arguably its best event, the floor exercise.

“I thought we did well,” Van Wicklen said. “We made a couple mistakes, but we also had some good performances. We'll learn from it and get back in the gym and work hard for our first home meet. The crowd was loud, but we knew that going in. We worked on mental toughness and I thought that was key to having a good performance.”

OU quickly got back on track with solid scores on floor. Freshman Levi Anderson led off with a 15.100, and he was followed by five more scores of at least 14.750, including Van Wicklen's event-winning total. The Sooners totaled 75.900 on the event and after a 65.400 from the Wolverines on pommel horse, OU entered rotation three leading 148.150-142.100.

On vault, junior Thao Hoang led off with a strong 14.600 and junior Alex Powarzynski followed that up with a career-best 15.100. To anchor the Sooner vault lineup, Van Wicklen stuck his landing and scored 15.500 to tie his career high and Bower scored 14.950, giving Oklahoma a 73.950.

With nearly a 10-point lead after three rotations, Oklahoma moved onto the rings for the fourth. Freshman Peter Daggett, making his collegiate debut, led off with a 13.850. OU's team total of 73.400 was anchored by a career-high 14.850 from Van Wicklen, 14.800 from Moldauer and 14.650 from Oyama.

Moving on to high bar, Anderson put up a career-best 14.800 with a stuck dismount in the three position. He was followed up by career-best routines from both Yee (14.850) and Moldauer (14.950). Strong marks from junior Hunter Justus (14.000) and Van Wicklen (14.250) helped give Oklahoma it best high bar total of the young season with 73.100.

Oklahoma moved to parallel bars for its last rotation, leading 367.700-356.400. Justus put the Sooners off on the right foot, posting a career-high 15.050 in the leadoff spot. Powarzynski followed him up with a routine that shattered his previous career high of 13.900, totaling 15.450. Moldauer anchored rotation and the night with a stuck dismount, and an OU season-high for any event, 16.000 to give the Sooners a total of 75.800 on the apparatus, their best this season.

“I was thrilled,” Moldauer said of sticking his parallel bars dismount. “It was all about the team. I made a couple mistakes earlier in the meet and I had to pick it up and show mental toughness. Parallel bars is my favorite event right now. The team has been helping me through this and they have been telling me I can make it perfect. In the gym you just try to find the event that is really yours and the team has helped me do that.”

The Sooners will be back in action next weekend when they welcome Iowa and California to the McCasland Field House on Saturday, Jan. 23. The meet is set for a 5 p.m. CT start.

"We are ready to rock the Field House, bring the energy and set a new record," said Van Wicklen.

Tickets are available for purchase online or by calling the OU Athletics Tickets Office at (405) 325-2424 or toll-free at (800) 456-GoOU.