For the second time this season, a gymnast injured herself in the warmup before a meet, but that did not stop the women's gymnastics team from hitting its highest score while defeating New Hampshire, 189.45-185.40, yesterday.

"It builds our confidence," Coach Judi Avener said. "It also sends a message to the rest of the Northeast that we are in fact worth what we've been saying."

In warming up on the uneven bars, all-arounder Allison Barber fell, slightly injuring her neck and back. Avener said she was taken out of the meet as a precaution and should recover quickly.

"I think we did prove something scoring our highest, even without our top all-arounder," said Kim Thrasher, who placed first in the all-around with a 37.75.

Laurie Russo took Barber's place in the all-around.

"We knew Laurie (Russo) was next in line," Thrasher said. "We were well prepared. We didn't feel pressured to find someone."

The Lady Lions not only improved their highest season score by 2.45, but improved their all-time high by 1.10. They also broke records on the uneven bars and vault.

Without a break in their routines on the uneven bars, five Lady Lions posted a team score of 47.80. Kira Rohm won the event, with a 9.70 score, followed by New Hampshire's Lori Brady. Thrasher took third with her best performance on bars in her career, scoring a 9.60.

"My routine felt like (it was) the best," Thrasher said. "We really turned our bars around."

Competing in her first meet since she injured her foot on Jan. 27, Lynn Crane came back strong on the uneven bars with a 9.55.

On the first event of the meet, Lisa Mallios set yet another record, this time for the highest score on vault by a Penn State gymnast in Rec Hall. She won the vault with her 9.80 on her handspring front tuck, which is worth only a 9.90. With that vault, she was given the Ann Carr Award for the gymnast with the most inspirational performance.

New Hampshire's Lori Brady, who scored a 9.90 once this season, followed Mallios' performance and mustered a 9.70 for second place. Last year, she was awarded New Hampshire's Rookie-of the-Year.

"She did not do her best vault," Coach Gail Goodspeed said. "That was a weak vault."

Despite her vault performance and a break in her balance beam routine, Brady placed second in the all-around with 37.50 points.

Brady's teammate, Jan Dalziel, placed third in the all-around with 37.00. New Hampshire also earned its season high score, improving by .15.

"This is a real competitive group and we're going to keep giving Penn State the run for it," Goodspeed said.

But New Hampshire suffered some problems on the balance beam, an area Penn State has recently had difficulties with.

It broke five times in six routines. Goodspeed said the beam is usually one of the team's best events and the pressure of competing against Penn State in Rec Hall may have caused some of the shakiness.

"It was a good meet for us on three events," Goodspeed said. "I'm not happy with three out of four."