Back in October, Baldwinsville gymnast Maddie Brooks qualified for the New York State Public High School Athletic Association championships in the vault during the Section III meet.
Then Brooks waited and practiced until she and all the other top gymnasts in the state gathered at Cold Spring Harbor High School on Long Island Saturday to settle state honors.
In her specialty, the vault, Brooks put up a top score of 9.175, tying New Hartford’s Madelyn Massoud for 12th place out of 60 gymnasts.
Only the Spartans’ Miranda Smith did better among Section III competitors, taking second place with 9.70 as Section XI’s Skye Harper claimed the victory with a 9.775.
But the larger story was that Brooks, Smith and the rest of the Section III contingent claimed the state team title, their score of 184.825 just ahead of Section VI’s runner-up score of 184.200.
And Smith was the all-around state champion, scoring 9.600 on floor exercise and balance beam and 9.775 on uneven bars to finish first on each of those individual apparatus.
Two other New Hartford gymnasts – Sienna Zuccaro and Kennedy Massoud – were on the Section III team with Smith and Madelyn Massoud, plus Jamesville-DeWitt-F-M’s Rylee Fishkin, Rachel McKean and Zoe Potamianos, Whitesboro’s Taylor Bushey, Kiara Khiamdavanh, Sophia Lubia and Madison Scialdone, East Syracuse Minoa/Liverpool’s Delia Korseniewski and Central Square’s Peter Ferrante.
