Feb. 12, 2016
By Mandy Bell, GoPSUSports.com Student Staff Writer
UNIVERSITY PARK ââ'¬" Emma Sibson was ready to start off her junior season strong after being named second-team All-Big Ten and tying for fifth on the vault at the B1G Championships in 2015.
As Penn State neared the season-opening meet against North Carolina State, Sibson went down with a hamstring injury and had to watch the team's first three meets from the sidelines.
With the team consisting of seven freshmen, three sophomores and four juniors, the Nittany Lions lost one of its key leaders with much experience in collegiate competition.
"It was a different perspective being on the sideline. It gave me a chance to step up as a leader with my voice and not just my actions in the gym," Sibson said. I think I helped a lot on the sideline with little things like confidence level like, 'Hey you got it, don't be nervous,' or helping with bad days."
Watching her team get off to a slow start, Sibson pushed herself to try to get competition-ready as quickly as she could, but unfortunately for her, it is a slow process.
"I did a lot of bike work to keep my endurance and a lot of upper body stuff," Sibson said. "For rehab I did a lot of things to make my hamstring stronger and the muscles around it so it would heal better."
After only being able to compete five gymnasts on the floor routine against Illinois in the team's previous meet, the Nittany Lions desperately were searching for a sixth gymnast to help take some pressure off of the team. Two days before travelling to Michigan State, Sibson knew she would be able to step up.
Sibson's floor routine is what edged the Nittany Lions over the Spartans in the third rotation. After a fall by a teammate, Penn State relied on Sibson to clutch her routine in order to keep the Nittany Lions in the lead. Sibson "stuck" her routine and scored a 9.850 to give Penn State a .75 lead going into the final rotation.
"It gave the rest of the team more confidence. The Illinois meet we obviously only had five girls to do floor routines, so it adds a lot of pressure knowing that you have to hit your routine and unfortunately one of the girls fell," head coach Jeff Thompson said. "So, having Emma in the lineup as the sixth person, we did have someone fall, but Emma was able to hit in the anchor spot and cover, so we didn't have to count that fall. That's why we were able to post the highest score of the year so far."
Not only did Sibson save the Nittany Lions on the floor routine, but she also took home the vault title posting a 9.825.
"Emma's two strongest events are vault and floor," said Thompson. "She's shown over the last two years she's one of the best in the country so not having her in the lineup the last three meets effected our team score obviously. So getting her back from the hamstring injury was great for our team and program. She went out there and performed like we expected by winning vault and tying for second on floor."
Penn State was able to celebrate both the return of Emma Sibson and the team gaining its first victory of the season.
"It felt amazing. I was coming off of 5 weeks being off," Sibson said. "I definitely knew my scores could help the team out. Coming off of three losses, I wanted nothing more than to be able to contribute and help."
The Nittany Lions walked away from the Michigan State victory thinking they found the missing puzzle piece to a team that continued to come up just short of its opponents for three straight meets. However, two days later, Penn State had to go back to square one.
"Unfortunately on Monday, [Sibson] hyperextended her knee and she's out again. It's sad," Thompson said. "Her first tumbling pass on floor has a very difficult double front. Her hand slipped off of her knee just before she landed and so her one leg came out straight. When her heal hit the ground way out in front of her, her knee just went out the wrong way a little bit."
Sibson is back where she was a few weeks ago, trying to battle back from yet another injury to get back in the lineup to help her team.
"This week I'm just taking it easy and sitting on the sidelines at practice," Sibson said. "I'm just trying to keep my fitness level up."
Penn State will travel to Columbus to take on Ohio State at 4 p.m. on Saturday.