Iowa State’s performance against No. 16 Illinois Friday night wasn’t pretty at times, but it didn’t have to be. The Cyclones (4-2) 194.100-191.650 victory may not have been what the 1,808 fans in attendance are accustomed to seeing, but their effort was more than enough to win the match.

“I was very disappointed in my team tonight,” said coach K.J. Kindler. “Overall, I really thought we looked like amateurs. I know they’re much better than that and we have a lot of work to do. We didn’t look like the No. 7 team in the country tonight.”

The gymnasts said they were disappointed in their performances as well.

“Overall, we did OK winning, but when you look at it individually on each event, we didn’t do nearly as good as we are capable of doing,” said junior Katie Lasher. “We’re a much better team than what we showed the crowd tonight.”

The night did have some bright spots for Iowa State, which got off to a great start on the vault, posting a score of 48.900, its highest single-event score of the night, with the Cyclones in the top five spots. Junior Janet Anson, runner-up on vault at last year’s NCAA national championships, led the Cyclones with a 9.875.

“Vault is definitely an area that we’re really strong on and I expect what they did tonight,” Kindler said. “I expect it every time they go out. They’re a very good vaulting team.”

The Cyclones stayed strong on the uneven bars, posting a score of 48.600, but did have some mishaps. Lasher fell when trying to grab the high bar, a mistake she said shook her up for the rest of the performance.

“That was a total fluke,” Lasher said. “Missing my hand like that, I’ve never done that before in my life. I was just really surprised, and it kind of messed up the rest of my routine, so I was kind of angry.”

Although the Cyclones posted season-high team scores on beam (48.150) and floor (48.450), Kindler acknowledged that there is still room for improvement.

“On beam, we made similar mistakes that we did last week, which I was not expecting,” she said. “We went into the gym and worked very hard to fix those but I didn’t see any results.

“We might need to do some tweaking of routines because we have seen similar mistakes the last two weeks, so that’s definitely something we’re going to have to work on.”

Kindler said she believes the team’s endurance was the main factor in the Cyclones struggles on the floor exercise.

“On floor, I thought I saw some weak legs, some tired legs and that’s absolutely something we can’t have,” she said. “They’ve got to be better conditioned and I guarantee they’re not going to miss like that again.”

Despite the mishaps on the floor exercise, Anson and senior Erin Dethloff each had solid performances, posting scores of 9.900 and 9.825, respectively.

“It was my best performance on floor this season, but I wouldn’t say it’s my best [ever],” Anson said. “I still have room to improve. Until you get a 10.0, it can’t be your best.”

Iowa State’s next meet is Jan. 28 in Iowa City against the University of Iowa.

Dethloff, who placed in the top three in each event and was the meet’s all-around champion, said she believes the two-week layoff comes at a good time for the Cyclones.

“Tonight we had a couple of mistakes that were uncharacteristic,” she said. “There’s going to be a lot of work done in the gym to fix our mistakes that happened tonight.”

Kindler said she hopes to see an overall stronger showing from her team against Iowa. A win against the Hawkeyes clinches the Hy-Vee Cy-Hawk Series for Iowa State.