Midway through the women's gymnastics team's meet with IUP and Pittsburgh Saturday night, fans witnessed an avalanche.

In a matter of minutes, the Lady Lions' season-long consistency spiraled to earth -- and so did six of the last eight Penn State gymnasts to compete on the uneven bars and the balance beam.

Coach Judi Avener's "rocks" tumbled violently to the mat, time after time. Junior Allison Barber fell twice, while Janice Rogers, Laurie Russo and April Polito also dropped off the apparatus. Even freshman Tracy Kerner experienced the first fall of her collegiate career on the balance beam -- although she still won the all-around with a 37.95.

And even though the No. 8 Lady Lions (7-4) came away with the easy victory, Avener was extremely displeased with their performance in scoring a 190.35. Pittsburgh (4-11) and IUP (1-19) scored a 183.05 and a 181.5, respectively.

"It was disappointing," the coach said. "We talked about it, we tried to avoid the letdown, but somehow it happened anyway."

"I think the meet was definitely hard physically and mentally," said Barber, who scored an 8.6 on the uneven bars. "I started off being aggressive and then I would jump ahead on the next trick and not flow through on the one I was doing."

But the Lady Lions weren't the only ones who tasted the mat Saturday night. The Indians and the Lady Panthers had gymnastics purists cringing in their seats as performers regularly miscued. IUP recorded scores as low as 6.85 with various falls and violations on many routines.

"(The falls) might have been contagious, but I think people just didn't follow through," said Rogers. "I didn't follow through on my cue on bars -- consequently I fell."

Rogers made up for her fall with a 9.8 on the floor exercise, capturing the first Ann Carr Award of her career. The award goes to the gymnast who "provides the most inspirational performance at each home meet."

Other positives included school record 9.85 by Kerner and Jada Hiltabrand on the uneven bars, and a career-high 9.75 by Kerry Slattery on the balance beam.

"I think we came back really well on the floor," Avener said. "Karen Cimochowski and Kerry Slattery did a great job -- as freshmen, they're handling the pressure really well."

But the meet puts added pressure on the team to regroup as they travel west to take on Stanford and No. 1 Utah.

"It makes us re-evaluate everything we've been doing," Rogers said. "We had a real good scoring opportunity tonight and we kind of blew it."

Said Avener, "We haven't had a real bad meet this year. This is our worst meet of the season. Hopefully this will give us a needed kick in the butt and we'll learn and grow from here."