The Barometer Online

Issue date: 4/9/09 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Jeff Wick Wearing tape - a reminder of her surgically repaired Achilles - Becky Colvin has rejoined her teammates and vaulted for a career best 9.9 at the NCAA Central Region Championships.

Last April, the Oregon State gymnastics team was in Athens, Ga., to compete in the NCAA Championships.

Then-freshman Becky Colvin was not in Athens. Instead, Colvin was in Corvallis waiting for updates from her teammates on how they were doing back east.

"It's always hard to leave a teammate behind," sophomore Jen Kesler said. "We brought her back stuff and tried to talk to her as much as we could. We just wanted to see how she was doing, make sure she was in a good mood and trying to stay strong."

Looking back to January of 2008, the Eugene native seemed to have begun her collegiate gymnastics career in promising fashion, making two lineups and putting up respectable numbers on both floor and vault.

Everything seemed to be going well for Colvin until Feb. 15, 2008, when Colvin tore her Achilles tendon during warm-ups for a home meet against Stanford and Seattle Pacific.

"When I did it, I knew immediately that something was wrong and I wasn't going to do season any more," Colvin said. "My emotion was more that my season was over. It was painful but half of me was just 'I don't get to compete.'"

The Beavers defeated both the Cardinal and Falcons in the tri-meet, but it was the loss of Colvin that stood out to some of her Beaver teammates.

"It was really hard. That night I couldn't even look at her cause I would start crying," said sophomore Jereme Bigelow. "Most of the time she stayed very positive, but it really did break my heart because everything she put into it was over."

Shortly after tearing her Achilles, Colvin went under the knife to have the tendon repaired. Once on crutches, Colvin wondered how her injury would impact her career at Oregon State. Being the family it is, the gymnastics team continued to embrace its downed teammate.

"This team is very supportive of everyone in any situations," Colvin said. "I noticed with my Achilles everyone took the time to ask how I was doing. They all helped me out. Some people have superstitions where they won't touch the crutches, but they overcame that and would help me. That made me feel good as a freshman because they were upperclassmen and I didn't know what they were going to say."

Continued...

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