EAU CLAIRE NORTH — A 138.800 at the Big Rivers Conference meet earned the River Falls gymnastics team a third-place finish of seven teams at Eau Claire North on Saturday. Sitting at fifth in the conference entering the day, the event showed that the Wildcats are getting prepared at the right time.

“All week we had just kind of been talking about how we were going to kind of use this meet as a precursor to next week,” Head Coach Bridgette Lensing said. “Using that more of a pressure situation versus a triangular meet to work out maybe some of the kinks or some of those nerves.”

Individually, freshman Ruby Amundson took third in all-around with a 36.300, first in beam with a 9.250, second in vault with a 9.300 and fourth in floor with a 9.375. Ava Petraitis finished fifth in beam for River Falls with an 8.900.

The attitude they came in with helped to ease the pressure and brought the best out of River Falls.

“We really try to work into these last couple weeks and start to peak at this time,” Lensing said. “We had a great meet on Saturday, but we had some falls on beam, bars there were a couple things in routines that didn’t maybe go as planned. Still spots that we can make small improvements on, and at this point in the season, that’s what you want. You have a week left before sections, and you don’t want to worry about making big changes.”

With some of the season’s top scores all coming in the month of February, the Wildcats truly are peaking at the right time. Although they call themselves the lucky seven as there are seven of them on the team, the improved scores stem from far more than luck. They have gotten comfortable doing exactly what the team needs of them, avoiding major mistakes that can drastically alter the team’s score.

“I think all of our girls have really started to understand or realize what their role, what their job is and how important each of their routines is when they go out to compete,” Lensing said.

Whether they compete in one event or all of them, Lensing can count on her team to stay focused on the task at hand.

“With five girls competing varsity, if someone makes a mistake, the other four, they have to step it up because those four are the scores that we might have to count,” Lensing said.

Looking ahead, the Wildcats are hungry to keep the season alive at Sectionals in Ashland on Saturday.

“We’ve been calling them our lucky seven all year, so we’re hoping our luck continues with us next week,” Lensing said.