No. 4 Texas A&M equestrian opened its season against No. 7 Baylor with a 16-3 win at the Hildebrand Equine Complex on Friday, Sept. 28. The matchup was the Meet of the Week for the National Collegiate Equestrian Association.
The Aggies took the fences part of the competition with 4 points to none over the Bears. The points came from freshman Kate Egan, junior Brooke Brombach, senior Devon H. Thomas and sophomore Alexa Leong, with each achieving scores of 85, 81, 87 and 87, respectively.
In the horsemanship competition, senior Ella Petak scored the first point for the Aggies with a 75.5-74.5 victory over junior Alexis Rutledge.
The Maroon and White were able to go up 3-0 with Baylor junior Nadalee Vasquez scoring zero points before junior Millie Landon outscored her opponent by half a point.
However, the Bears were able to make it 3-1 with fifth year senior Elsie Naruszewicz scoring 75 to just pass graduate student Cori Cansdale’s 74 score.
A&M was able to finish the horsemanship competition with a 4-1 score from Ellie Gerbrandt winning 71-68.5 over sophomore Anna Thorn.
The flats part of the day had the Aggies win in a 5-0 point sweep. Brombach started it off for the Aggies by defeating sophomore Lauren Reid 90-88, and Rylee Shufelt was able to follow that with a 88-74 win over fifth year senior Dominka Silvestri.
The lead for the Maroon and White in this event changed to three when H. Thomas beat out senior Madi Mitchell 93-92 in a high-scoring affair.
To cap off the win for the Aggies in the flats round, senior Maggie Nealon and sophomore Devan M. Thomas beat their opponents with scores 91-67 and 88-82.
The final event of the day ended with a 2-2 score. Sophomore Gracie Casebolt and junior Mattie Gustin won 71.5-66.5 and 70-66.5 to give Aggies their points for the event.
The Bears’ 2 points came from senior Emily Moomaw and sophomore Rylee Butler, who beat out junior Lauren Hanson and senior Keesa Luers 69-67.5 and 72-68.5.
The Aggies will go on to play the Georgia Bulldogs on Friday, Oct. 6, for their BTHO Breast Cancer match.