Beaver Gymnastics battled it out against 10th ranked Stanford in Gill Coliseum on Friday night, where they would take a slim defeat.
This marked the 108th meeting between the two programs, and the 36th meeting within Corvallis.
Even in defeat, Oregon State showed they can rise to any challenge with a new 2026 high team score of 197.250 to Stanfords 198.150.
“It was nice to see them really kind of put more of a complete meet together,” Head Coach Tanya Chaplin said.
The Beavers were unable to take away any of the four events, with the largest gap being on bars with a separation of .400.
Stanford claimed victory thanks to the bigger gaps within the vault and bars event. But also sported a very solid beam line with no gymnast going below 9.800.
From the beginning on vault, it was clear as day it was a Sophia Esposito kind of day. Supercharging her team by following fellow junior Olivia Buckner’s 9.900 with her own 9.950. Both finished off by perfect landings.
“Before I vaulted I knew I was going to stick it,” said Esposito.
Esposito would perform at this level for the remainder of the competition, earning her new collegiate high in each event but the floor routine, but this also secured her a new high all-around score as well at 39.700.
“I love competing all-around. I did my freshman year, it’s just a different type of fire in my chest,” Esposito said.
Oregon State performed very adamantly as a whole in the floor routine competition. Stanford being ranked sixth nationally in the event posed a true challenge, but the Beavers seemed to raise the floor on their floor.
This event was their second lowest in separation of points, despite it being one of their usual weaker events, as they are ranked at 31st nationally.
It would be junior Anna Roberts that would seal away the Beavers chance for an upset. She earned the highest all-around performance in the competition at 39.875 with her lowest score being 9.875 on vault and her highest being the only 10 score in the entire event on vault.
The Beavers will now go back on the road, as their next competition will take place in Logan, Utah, as they take on Utah State on March 6.
