Mark Hartley Quotations

From OCC to district, our bar score came up almost four points. It was huge, a big difference.

We were a decent team this year, and if we wouldn't have had some of those injuries we would've been up there with some of the great teams Grove City has ever had.

We should've been in the mid- to upper-30s all year, but with our injuries, it really hurt us in some areas. We went from an 8.9 on bars (Nicole Saunders) to counting a 4.6.

When she first came back to the team, she said she only wanted to do bars. Then Nicole got hurt and she stepped into the all-around. She got motivated and got into it. If it wasn't for Amber, we wouldn't be in this situation.

We finished up on floor, and that was the best floor we've had all year. (Davidson) was ahead of us, but we made it a lot closer there in the end. We knew we needed to be second place or better to win the OCC Championship.

This has been a roller-coaster year. We knew we had the talent and ability to go to states, and then we got hit with a run of injuries. For Nicole to come back and compete on bars today was huge.

There's a possibility of getting her back. Even if it was just on bars, that adds three points to our score right there.

It was great to see Amanda make it to the state individual competition in vault again. The last four years she's been one of our leaders, so I was really happy she will be going in vault and the team competition.

I chose bars because I knew that was our weak point. We followed with the beam, which is our second-weakest event. I thought if we could start on bars and get something rolling there that we'd be in good shape. It worked out perfectly. We didn't have any problems on bars. Nicole got a 7.8 without a dismount. If her foot would've allowed her to dismount, she would've gotten an 8.8.