Niwot’s Curry striving for team, not personal, success
2019 Class 4A all-around champ ready to tackle leadership role
While some of her former teammates at Niwot respectfully opted out of the spring gymnastics season due to conflicts with club, Cougars all-around young star Mia Curry had a ‘no-brainer’ kind of moment when thinking about what possible challenges she’d face tr ying to balance both.
Not much of the thought process pertained to her being the defending Class 4A all-around champion, either.
Despite there being a roster decline for NHS -- rosters across the board, for that matter, due to variance approvals in order to even have a sanctioned season with championships at the conclusion -- Curry is threaded into the high school scene because it’s enjoyable to be around teammates working toward a common goal.
“As much as I love competing for my club ... being on the high school team has
changed my life so much and I love the community sense and the team sense of high school,” Curry said this week, ahead of a big Wednesday night meet against Broomfield. “Club has helped me progress, but having the suppor t of a team is amazing.
“I’m hoping that we’re super successful, as much as we can be, and that I can help lead them to that. I want to tr y and get us all to a state team title first and foremost, because that would be much more fulfilling.”
Curr y is expected to raise the bar once again in the classification, no doubt. An all-around score of 37.000 during the last state meet held in fall of 2019, not to mention an individual title on 4A floor exercise, has her among just a handful of challengers for 2021 titles.
She wants more, of course. But she also knows gymnastics is a spor t where rosters are in flux and that stellar gymnasts pop up out of nowhere deciding to compete for high school just to feel something different.
A lot of her goals are evidently team-oriented, though. The Cougars finished third in 2019, and with Curry and Olivia Sroka in the mix, a smaller team of 11 girls are hopeful that similar results, or better, can occur. For Curry, being a leader in helping get new participants up to speed is going to be vital with a compacted schedule that includes more meets and fewer practices in just a few weeks’ time before regionals starting April 15.
The regular season of seven total meets ends April 10.
“We have a lot of girls returning from last year, so we’re already close ... but it’s been really easy for the new girls to integrate into the team and think we’re going to be closer than we already are,” Curry said. “One of the challenges that somanyofthemhaveovercome and that I’m so proud of is that some of them haven’thadaclubgymthat they could consistently train at (the past year). They are doing amazing at getting in the (high school) gym for practice and doing their skills well.”
“Mia has really come in and tried to help take the team and lean them towards understanding a season ... just being as prepared as possible with her knowledge,” Niwot head coach Marisa Purcell added of her captain. “I also expect her to make a run for it, for herself individually,butalsojusthelpingher teammates getting the competing aspect down.”
Other conflicts, not bad by any means, have been challenging for Niwot’s Sroka. She’s a junior Olympic skier just wrapping up some major national competitions, so jumping right into the gym might not be easy. But there’s no doubt Sroka will be in a finalist in individual events and allaround in 2021.
Purcell also boasts Madison Sloane (34th in 4A allaround in 2019) and has hopes that freshman Grace Gutierrez turns some heads, among others.
Broomfield Eagles
Coach: Whitney Parzybok
The Scorecard: There’s plenty of reason for hope for the Eagles, the Boulder Valley district team, with a couple of really strong contenders for individual or allaround titles. While Pomona is the gold standard in Class 5A, the Eagles’ Darcy Jew could already be considered a top all-around challenger after placing eighth in 2019. She’s a senior looking to go out with a bang. Fellow seniors Alli Willmarth and Jessica Lukac have worked tirelessly to be in the rotation for three events. Junior Brenna Calvo is a ‘power house’ on the bars, Parzybok exclaimed, and junior Sophia Grif fith is expected to excel on the beam. “We are just glad to give these hard working seniors a season,” Parzybok wrote. “It’s already been 2 weeks full of challenges with quarantines and injuries but these girls will rally and push hard for the next few weeks to (clinch) a spot in the state meet.”
Legacy/mountain Range
Coach: Diane Clark
The Scorecard: Mountain Range, the Adams 12 district team, finished in eighth place at the Class 5A state meet in 2019 and was a mere handful of points from fifth. The team has a number of returners including junior Jenna Bossi (23rd in 2019 all-around) and Kassie Chapman (40th) along with state hopefuls Alex Wallis, Jules and Dani Medina and Bridget Gray. Melina Andretich and Kenna Crookham both join the team looking for great performances in this quick season. “Excited that we actually get to compete. It is giving the girls some sortofnormalcy,andsome rewards for their hard work for the past year and a half,” Clark explained. “We scored a 167 our first meet and a 173.9 our second meet, so much improved. Looking forward to that score going up.”