The ISU gymnastics team will look to ride its recent success on the floor exercise into its first win of the season when the Cyclones travel to No. 8 Oklahoma on Friday.

The Cyclones posted a score of 48.900 on floor their last time out, which was far and away their best score of the season.

“We spent a lot of extra time working on our landings and tumbling,” said coach Jay Ronayne. “We’re also always focused on our leaps and jumps.”

Ronayne said that each move during a gymnast’s floor routine is given a letter value of A through E, with A being the easiest and E the most difficult. A gymnast then receives bonus tenths of a point for each difficult move they pull off during the routine.

“We try and have as many high-level C, D or E elements as we can,” Ronayne said.

Ronayne admitted, however, that he tends to be pretty conservative because it’s a high-risk, high-reward situation.

The Cyclones struggled on floor in their first three meets, which cost them a win against Minnesota, but their performance against Stanford showed that the young Cyclones are improving.

Volunteer assistant coach and former Cyclone All-American Janet Anson is in charge of coaching the floor exercise.

“I watch and make sure that everyone is sharp and with the music and on beat,” Anson said.

While most teams have instrumental music montages playing during the floor exercise, Iowa State mixes popular music into its two-minute floor routine.

Assistant coach TeShawne Jackson said the recognizable music played during floor brings the crowd into the match.

Then the fired-up crowd helps the gymnast during her floor routine.

Jackson was responsible for choreographing all of the gymnasts’ floor routines for the season.

“This summer I listened to a lot of music and kind of pictured what they would do during the song,” Jackson said.

Jackson said the Cyclone gymnasts always have input on their floor routines, but they are usually shy about giving music input.

Iowa State will need a repeat on floor exercise if they want to upset Oklahoma this weekend. The Sooners are ranked 8th in the country and are the highest-ranked Big 12 team.

Iowa State has an overall record of 0-4 and is 0-1 in conference matchups, but has posted season-high scores in its last two meets.

Friday’s meet starts at 7 p.m. and can be seen on cyclones.com on Clone Zone.