Gymnastics winding down, but quartet’s friendship still strong

Each of the four local college gymnastics seniors is on schedule to graduate this spring or summer with the following degree(s).

? KayCee Gassaway, Brigham Young University — business management with emphasis in marketing, minor in communications.

? Kalliah McCartney, Sacramento State University — double major in accounting and international business.

? Dallas Smith, Sacramento State University — master’s degree in communication, focus on social media and marketing (earned bachelor’s degree in communication in 2013).

? Kayla Wonderly, Sacramento State University — double major in public relations and journalism.

The Sacramento State trio did not become Hornets as a package deal.

Kalliah McCartney committed to the program in August before their senior year in high school. Kayla Wonderly took her official visit in October and committed, then they both signed letters of intent November.

In June, Dallas Smith accepted an offer to join the team as a walk-on without having visited the campus. Her friends being there was just one factor in that decision, she said, but she trusted their judgment. After three seasons, she was placed on scholarship for her final academic year.

“She’s earned it, many times over,” Wonderly said.

“It’s definitely an honor,” Smith said. “I’m so appreciative to get it, but I just try to keep on doing the same things. I don’t want to change anything and become lackadaisical, I guess. I’m super appreciative of it, but I don’t think of it as any more pressure.”

The four little girls were 6 years old when they met at Naydenov Gymnastics in Vancouver.

They trained together for most of their years in club gymnastics and together attended both CAM High School in Battle Ground and Running Start classes at Clark College in Vancouver.

Vancouver’s KayCee Gassaway and Kalliah McCartney, Dallas Smith of Heisson and Kayla Wonderly of La Center are now college seniors.

McCartney and Wonderly were training at Multnomah Athletic Club by the end of their club gymnastics days. When they and Smith reunited as college freshmen at Sacramento State University, Gassaway had already been at Brigham Young University for a year after completing high school early.

So while they have not all been teammates ever since the day they met, as Smith said, “We’ve been best friends for 16 years.”

Gassaway took a redshirt season after ankle surgery in 2013, bringing the quartet’s standing back in line as college juniors a year ago. While the story would tie together particularly neatly if they were completing their gymnastics careers at the same time, it will not happen that way because McCartney is taking a medical redshirt season after foot surgery and will have a second chance at her senior season next year.

“I couldn’t have imagined it,” Wonderly said of her 6-year-old self and the idea that the Sacramento State trio in particular would go through so much of life together.

“We have obviously been through a lot together in four years of college,” she said. “They’re years when everything’s changing, but I know that being able to be on a college team with them has been an experience that I wouldn’t take back.”

Arriving at college with two best friends helped ease that transition.

“Going to college with your two best friends is honestly a dream come true,” McCartney said. “Their presence is just comforting. It’s reassuring. It’s like a little piece of home that you brought with you to the gym and a new environment. It makes being on the team so much more fun, because I knew I had them at my back. It’s an amazing opportunity to have both of them here.”

Like Wonderly, Smith — a walk-on who was put on scholarship as a senior — said their time at Sacramento State has been the best four years of her life.

“There are no bad moments that I can think of, just from being able to get a great education and getting to do the sport that I have been in love with ever since I was a little kid with two of my best friends, not to mention the new friends I’ve made here,” she said. “It’s just been absolutely amazing. College gymnastics made me fall in love with gymnastics again, so that’s something that I’ll treasure forever.”

While the three Hornets each cherish the fact that they are still teammates and have shared a house for two years, the long distance bond is still strong and there will be a Naydenov reunion of sorts in June when Gassaway marries her fiancé Andrew Potts.

“Life’s pretty busy, but I try to talk to them and kind of keep in touch,” Gassaway said. “We’ll text like, ‘Good luck this weekend’ and just stuff that’s going on. The three of them are going to be bridesmaids in my wedding this year.”

The approaching end

Gassaway, who competes in floor, vault and bars, had her final home meet Friday, while Smith (floor, beam) and Wonderly (beam, bars) have theirs coming up Sunday. McCartney, an all-around competitor when healthy, has a longer wait for hers.

BYU also has another regular season meet remaining before the teams go to their respective conference championships on March 21, BYU to the Mountain Rim Gymnastics Championship in Denver and Sacramento State to the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation championships in Anchorage, Alaska.

NCAA regional competitions are April 4, followed by NCAA nationals April 17-19 in Fort Worth Texas. All four of the locals competed at the NCAA Seattle Regional last year, when BYU qualified as a team and each of the Sacramento State gymnasts were individual qualifiers.

So senior night is a milestone that brings emotion — the three Hornets are anticipating the tears already — but it hardly marks the end.

“We’re still practicing and working hard in the gym, so I don’t think the fact that’s almost over has quite hit me yet — but at the end of the last meet, it was like, ‘Oh, wow. I won’t ever be competing here again,’ ” Gassaway said. “That’s kind of sad.”

Painful lessons

Gassaway and Wonderly have already fought the injury battle that McCartney faces now. Gassaway redshirted her junior season after reconstructive surgery to her left ankle. Wonderly missed much of her sophomore season after surgery to repair her left elbow.

Patience was the greatest lesson Gassaway took from the unwanted experience.

“It takes a long time to come back, and even though they say whatever your time frame is, to actually come back and be able to start doing stuff and then actually feel like normal again is a big time difference,” she said. “You can kind of come back and it’s a little frustrating, because you feel like you should be able to do all the stuff that you used to be able to do, but it just takes time. You get it — slower, at least for me, than I wanted it to be — but it came back.”

Wonderly considered walking away from the sport after shoulder and elbow injuries, but was rewarded for her perseverance.

“There were points when I considered just being done with gym altogether, but I came to realize when I thought about that that I couldn’t imagine not finishing my career and being able to retire instead of saying that I quit,” she said. “I learned that I can overcome anything, because it means that I can keep doing my dream until time runs out.”

Plans, interrupted

McCartney had pain in her left foot early in the season, competing through it until the pain became significant during warmups for a Jan. 30 meet at Oregon State. She skipped the vault and floor events at that meet because they require running, then was diagnosed the next week with a stress fracture and had surgery to insert a pin in the foot.

On crutches for 10 days following surgery and in a walking boot since, McCartney considered trying to come back for the postseason until she learned that she had not competed in too many events this season to take a medical redshirt.

“It was a bummer to find out, ‘OK, your foot is fractured, you’re going to have to have surgery and you won’t be competing your senior year,’ ” she said. “I was like, ‘Uhhh, this is not the plan I had in my mind.’ God works in mysterious ways, so we’re just following with that.”

McCartney last year became the first Hornet gymnast to qualify for the NCAA national championships, and she is a few months away from earning two college degrees. Because she already applied for spring graduation, she actually has to re-enroll in school for the fall and declare a new major.

While she has accomplished much, knowing that she will be back next year has brought her peace.

“I love competing so much that I would regret looking back and not taking the opportunity to compete one last time,” she said. “It doesn’t matter what happens. I want to know that I tried.”