East Lansing, Mich. — No. 14 Michigan State gymnastics will travel to Toledo, Ohio to compete in the Big Five Meet this weekend. Michigan State will compete in Saturday night’s portion of the event against Nebraska, Penn State, Minnesota and Rutgers at the Huntington Center.  

This past weekend, the Spartans competed on Friday in a tri-meet against Central and Western Michigan at Central and then again against Illinois at home. In an effort to rest gymnasts for Sunday, Friday night saw several college debuts being made by Spartan gymnastics.  Despite this, Michigan State was still able to leave Mount Pleasant with a win. Sunday went even better for the Spartans, as they set their program records in team score, floor and beam.

Here are season recaps of the four opponents this weekend:

Nebraska:

Nebraska is coming in with a 2-4 overall record. It is also 1-3 in the Big Ten. he Cornhuskers fell to Maryland on Feb. 11 in their most recent meet. Several Nebraska athletes set career highs against the Terps.

Minnesota:

The No. 6 Golden Gophers are 4-3 on the season, 3-2 in conference play so far. Minnesota is second in the nation on floor and in the top 10 for both vault and bars. Despite this, it comes off losses to both Maryland and Pitt, its second and third of the season.  

Penn State:

Penn State is still in search of its first conference win, as it is 0-4 in the Big Ten. It has seen success outside of the conference, though, as the team is 3-4 overall.  The Nittany Lions are coming off a loss to No. 1 Michigan, where Penn State set its season-high team score at 195.875.

Rutgers:

Rutgers is currently 6-9 overall and 1-3 in the Big Ten. The team also comes off of its season high, set at a 195.950 in its quad meet appearance on Feb. 11. This marked the Scarlet Knights’ fifth highest score in their program history.

After last weekend, Michigan State finally rose from its four-week long stay at No.15. Coming off such an excellent performance, the Spartans are hopeful to continue to climb the rankings and set new program records in their five remaining appearances this season.