Utah at Arizona State

Recap

The Big Storyline: For the first time since 2003, the Sun Devils snagged a win over the Utes as Hannah Scharf’s big day propelled Arizona State to a new season high and its first 197 of the year. She and teammate Sarah Clark’s near-perfect career highs on bars swung momentum in the home teams’ favor as the Sun Devils put up a 49.550 on bars to the Utes’ sub-49 on vault. Two 9.975s of its own in the final rotation wasn’t enough for Utah to finish off the comeback.

Implications: Utah was the lone Pac-12 team undefeated without ties prior to this contest, now dropping it below California, who remains without a loss. Arizona State—who has three conference losses—pulls closer to a .500 mark with its second win.

Records: The massive bars total for Arizona State ranks second in program history, while the team score ranks 11th. This was the highest ranked win in Jay Santos’ head coaching tenure for the Sun Devils.

Preview

Current Rankings: No. 4 Utah at No. 20 Arizona State

Why You Should Clear Space on Your DVR: All eyes will be on the Utes to see how they respond after losing Grace McCallum to injury in last week’s meet. Utah still put up a good score in that performance regardless of the situation, but will be tested again immediately by an Arizona State squad that’s been steadily improving over the last month.

You Can Fast Forward, but not Through This: Freshman Makenna Smith unexpectedly stepped into the all-around last week for Utah and totaled a respectable 39.400, so watch for her to be even better with the expectation of competing four events heading into the weekend. She’ll be pushed by the Sun Devils’ all-around duo of Hannah Scharf and Emily White, who often trade off as leader and consistently score above 39.350. Ute Maile O’Keefe has also started a 10-streak on beam and will be aiming to extend it to three.