All-around champ Genevieve Herion leads Downers Grove co-op to sectional title

HINSDALE – It’s good to be Genevieve Herion these days.

And the Downers Grove co-op senior was awfully good during Monday’s Hinsdale Central Sectional leading the Trostangs to 148 points for the title and a berth into the IHSA state girls gymnastics finals, Feb. 21-22.

Herion won vault (9.7) and beam (9.575), tied for first on floor (9.5) and took second on bars (9.4) to win the all-around title (38.175).

“We’ve been putting in a lot of hard work at practice and all the girls we’re just a family,” Herion said. “We stay together. We pick each other up. And I see all the girls working hard and I’m super proud of them and seeing that hard work pay off today was so special to see.”

Caroline Phillip took third in the all-around (37.225) and Edith Condon was sixth (36.35).

Phillip took fourth on floor (9.325) and bars (9.25) and fifth on beam (9.15). Condon was fourth on beam (9.275). Emilie Kuchta tied for fifth on vault (9.35).

“So proud of my girls,” Herion said. “They were amazing. I think on every event we stuck together, cheered loud, we were all there for each other. If someone had a bad routine we had teammates to pick each other up.”

Downers Grove co-op is advancing to state for the fifth straight season. Herion helped lead the Trostangs to a state title two years ago and to second place last February.

“I think we’ve just been putting in the work and we didn’t really have any expectations,” she said. “We’re just going out and doing gymnastics. We’ve been working hard and putting in the work because we all want it.”

She’s got one more weekend to do something special again for her high school gymnastics team.

“It’s been one of the greatest experiences of my life,” she said. “Meeting these girls and getting to do the sport we love together is something I hold dear to my heart.”

There’s still work to be done for the Trostangs.

“We had a good meet, not a great meet,” Trostangs coach Kristyn Campos said. “There’s room for improvement so that’s even better. We had some uncharacteristic falls, some nerves, but that’s ok. This was good for us as a good confidence builder.”

Lincoln-Way co-op put itself in a strong position for one of the four at-large team qualifiers, taking second with 143.6 while District 230 co-op’s 142.475 was slightly better than Oswego co-op’s 142.375, hurting the hopes of the Wanthers of returning to state for the first time since 2002.

Oswego seniors Ava Sullivan finished fourth (37) and Sam Phillip took fifth (36.475) to qualify for state. Sullivan also earned state berths by taking third on beam (9.4), fourth on vault (9.45) and fifth on floor (9.3). Sullivan took second on vault (9.55) and tied for first on floor with Herion.

“It was a really solid meet for all of us,” Sullivan said. “We did so, so good. We went 5-for-5 on beam, and bars was amazing. It just went so, so well. So we’ll see. I hate the waiting game, but it’s just a number so you got to wait and see.”

The competition was strong with the words “mini state tournament’ being strung together by some.

“It’s just so competitive and there’s nothing I can do about that,” Sullivan said. “I really do appreciate the competition. It makes it so much more fun. What would this be if there wasn’t this competition? But it went very well. I couldn’t have asked for anything more from my team. I’m so proud of them.”

Three sectionals remain through Thursday until the Wanthers know their fate.

“We’ll see what happens, if there’s another meet in the books for us,” Sullivan said, “I’m really happy this is how we went out, but we’ll see.”

Hinsdale South senior Anya Patel won bars (9.45) and took second in the all-around (37.425).

“Overall it was a really good meet,” Patel said. “I was really happy with my bar routine because it was definitely my best one of the season and I’m happy that the meet reflected that. But overall as a team I think this was one of our highest energy meets and we were all really excited to be here as a team.”

Patel also placed second on beam (9.45) and third on floor (9.375) to help the Hornets score 140.325 points for fifth.

“It’s really exciting,” she said. “We’re all just really close, and the last two years we’ve kind of had a small team and this is the first year where we’ve had a great group of girls that are all wanting to showing up to practice. They all want to work hard and be there for each other. To get here we won a regional for I think the third time in our school history so we’re all super excited.”