Feb. 21, 2005

The USC Equestrian Team suffered a loss to West Texas A&M University on February 20 in Canyon, Texas after undergoing a real shake up in their starting line up. Leaving two players originally scheduled to start at home for violating team policies, the equestrian team hit more adversity when Junior Courtney Borton missed her schedule flight from Jackson, Mississippi to Amarillo on Saturday afternoon. Three more athletes were hospitalized early Sunday morning with food poisoning and they also were unable to compete.

“I’m not one to make excuses for losing”, Coach Duncan said. “But I can honestly say with all the adversity we suffered this week, this loss wasn’t so hard to take. Our girls did their best, and we were missing some key players and had some adversities that were impossible to overcome.”

The Lady Gamecocks lost to West Texas A&M by a score of 947.25 to 921. “We had horsemanship riders reigning and reining riders riding horsemanship to fill the spots and it was crazy for us.”

Freshman Michelle Groh put in the most solid performances of the day in reining and horsemanship. She defeated her opponent by 2 in horsemanship and in reining, busted that opponent by 5. She has had very little practice in reining. She was recruited as a horsemanship rider, and has only started reining since coming to USC in the fall.

Freshman Kristen Terebesi had the biggest point spread in equitation over fences and beat her opponent by 9 1/2. Sophomore Sarah Lowe also put in a solid trip to beat her opponent by 5. The Lady Gamecocks won the Equitation over fences division by 4.5.

Junior Tara Brothers and Laura Pipkin and freshman Allison Bradley were the athletes affected by food poisoning. They were released from the hospital in Amarillo to rest a day before returning to Columbia. They will return on Monday afternoon. ” I give a lot of credit to West Texas A&M. They were prepared and rode well. It just wasn’t in the cards for us this weekend” said Coach Duncan.

Current Record: 2-4 Next meet: Auburn, February 26, 2005 at Auburn. The USC Equestrian Team suffered a loss to West Texas A&M University on February 20 in Canyon, Texas after undergoing a real shake up in their starting line up. Leaving two players originally scheduled to start at home for violating team policies, the equestrian team hit more adversity when Junior Courtney Borton missed her schedule flight from Jackson, Mississippi to Amarillo on Saturday afternoon. Three more athletes were hospitalized early Sunday morning with food poisoning and they also were unable to compete.

“I’m not one to make excuses for losing”, Coach Duncan said. “But I can honestly say with all the adversity we suffered this week, this loss wasn’t so hard to take. Our girls did their best, and we were missing some key players and had some adversities that were impossible to overcome.”

The Lady Gamecocks lost to West Texas A&M by a score of 947.25 to 921. “We had horsemanship riders reigning and reining riders riding horsemanship to fill the spots and it was crazy for us.”

Freshman Michelle Groh put in the most solid performances of the day in reining and horsemanship. She defeated her opponent by 2 in horsemanship and in reining, busted that opponent by 5. She has had very little practice in reining. She was recruited as a horsemanship rider, and has only started reining since coming to USC in the fall.

Freshman Kristen Terebesi had the biggest point spread in equitation over fences and beat her opponent by 9 1/2. Sophomore Sarah Lowe also put in a solid trip to beat her opponent by 5. The Lady Gamecocks won the Equitation over fences division by 4.5.

Junior Tara Brothers and Laura Pipkin and freshman Allison Bradley were the athletes affected by food poisoning. They were released from the hospital in Amarillo to rest a day before returning to Columbia. They will return on Monday afternoon. ” I give a lot of credit to West Texas A&M. They were prepared and rode well. It just wasn’t in the cards for us this weekend” said Coach Duncan.

Current Record: 2-4 Next meet: Auburn, February 26, 2005 at Auburn.