Head coach Kathie Klages said both of them have fought through injury to stick with the sport they love.

Neal has battled injuries her entire career, but recovered to the tune of Second-Team All-Big Ten honors a season ago.

Teike came to MSU with a bad knee, and tore her ACL on her other knee during her sophomore year, which forced her to go into a coaching role.

Klages said Teike has been a valuable asset to the team even though it’s been tough to give up her passion.

“It’s hard to give up the sport and still come into the gym every single day,” Klages said. “She has a great attitude, and has really helped these athletes when they’re down or struggling with a skill, Shanthi’s always there to help get through it.”

Neal said her emotions on senior night will definitely be heightened because of the matchup with Michigan, and that she’s more excited than sad.

“Being here has built my character and made me into a stronger person through all my endeavours injury wise,” Neal said.

She will have family on hand this Saturday to recognize her time at MSU. Though her time as an athlete will be done, Neal will be around next season to help out as a coach in Teike’s old position.

Much like this season, Neal said her main priority will be helping the new team gel.

“Just making sure we all stay as one,” she said. “We’re more successful that way, and the season’s more fun that way.”

Renewing the rivalry

Sophomore Alina Cartwright set career-best scores in the all-around the past two meets, and said the team knows what they need to do to improve on their season-high score of 196.0 last week.

“The last couple of meets that we’ve been doing good, we completely ignored the other team and just focused on what we’re doing,” Cartwright said. “We still think that we can put up a good fight.”

The matchup with Michigan won’t be easy as the Wolverines average 196.939 points per meet, and they have won all but two Big Ten Championships since 1999.

Klages said there is a chance to do better than the 196.0 they got against Penn State, and with the good practices they’ve had this week, there’s a good chance they will build on that score.

“Michigan is a program that has just dominated the Big Ten gymnastics scene for years,” she said. “We again have to worry about us and our team and not worry about the fact that it is Michigan, and we need to build upon what we did last weekend against Penn State.”