ANNAPOLIS, Md. – The Navy gymnastics team continued its successful run of postseason action on Saturday with a strong performance on its way to a fifth straight ECAC Championship title. Hosting a field of six talented conference foes, No. 9 Navy controlled the contest and rolled to a 7.7-point victory over its nearest rival No. 12 Springfield. Four event individual winners and five of the top-six scores on the high bar aided the Mids to the win in front of a loud and boisterous crowd at the Halsey Field House Gymnastics Facility.
 
The final scoreboard had Navy first with 394.45 and Springfield College second at 386.75. William & Mary rounded out the podium in third place with 383.55 points. The second half of the leaderboard was Army in fourth at 377.65, Greenville in fifth at 376.25 and Simpson in sixth with 346.65 points.
 
Navy received contributions from across its roster as Midshipmen gymnasts won individual titles in four of the six events. Isaiah Drake (So., Los Angeles, Calif.) led the hosts as he finished atop the podium for his efforts on the floor exercise, parallel bars and all-around competition. Junior Ronan McQuillan (Katy, Texas) and senior team captain Giovanni Gambatese (Pewaukee, Wisc.) also captured gold on the pommel horse and high bar, respectively.
 
"I was pleased with the effort today," remarked head coach Kip Simons. "We still have some areas to clean up as we make our final preparations heading into the NCAA Championships in about 12 days. We have still not had a complete performance this season; I know what this team is capable of. We came up a little bit short on some of our goals today, but overall, I feel today was a step in the right direction. It was a total team effort.

"Ronan McQuillan had a great set for us on the pommel horse. Isaiah Drake winning the all-around and coming up big on a couple of events was the key to our success. We can't miss five routines like we did today. If we want to be a top-six program at the NCAA Championships, we're going to have to go 30-for-30."

As a team, Navy scored 68.4 points on the floor exercise, 63.4 on the pommel horse, 63.7 on the rings, 69.3 on the vault, 65.9 on the parallel bars and 64.95 on the high bar.
 
The Mids' championship day started on the pommel horse with strong results from the top end of its five-man lineup. McQuillan was the story of the apparatus as he crushed his previous career-high of 13.9 by 0.55 points on Saturday with a 9.15 execution score for his 5.3 starting value routine for an overall score of 14.45. Syam Buradagunta (Jr., Westborough, Mass.) gave Navy a lock of the top-two positions as he grabbed silver with a 13.4 score that bested the rest of the field by 0.15 points. Drake nearly made it three Mids in the top-10 as he posted a 12.2 result that was good for 11th overall.
 
On the ensuing event, the rings, Navy had three gymnasts in the top-10 with their sophomore class leading the cause. Drake paced the Mids with a third-place score of 13.4. Riley Rose (Las Vegas, Nev.) and Sabastian Gordon (Old Tappan, N.J.) tied for ninth place with identical 12.85 results. In his first conference championship, Danilo Viciana (Fr., Marietta, Ga.) was 0.15 points back in 13th place with a 12.7.
 
While not at the top of the podium on the vault, the Mids still had solid results with a pair of top-10 performances. Buradagunta netted a 13.95 score to finish eighth in the standings. Drake was graded 0.1 points lower for his vault and finished up in a two-way tie for tenth with Greenville's Michael Avery.

Leading after three rotations, the Mids started pulling away in the second half of the competition as Navy gymnasts finished in first place in each of the final three events. Drake won his first individual event of the day as he out-dueled his teammate Vishal Mandava (So., Cypress, Texas), 13.8 to 13.75 on the parallel bars. After a pair of Springfield entrants, Matthew Petros (Fr., Broadview Heights, Ohio) garnered his first-ever All-ECAC honor with a fifth-place result of 13.5.
 
In the most dominant performance of the championship, Navy's entire high bar team finished in the top-six. Gambatese rolled to the victory with a 13.4 score that bested Springfield's Owen Carney by 0.15 points. Caleb Hickey (Jr., Carthage, N.C.) garnered a bronze medal for his routine of 13.0, while the trio of Petros, Rose and Gordon all tied for fourth place with 12.85 efforts.
 
"Looking at the events today, Coach Holt has done an amazing job with our high bar team," commented Simons. "It was really excited watching them performed in front of a packed house here at Halsey. Every single one of our high bar guys hit their routine and stuck their dismounts. They were definitely one of the highlights of us today. They exhibited the grit and guts of this program."
 
Energized by the previous high bar action, the floor exercise lineup matched that output with five gymnasts in the top-six, including a clean sweep of the top-four. Drake collected gold again with a 14.35 routine that was 0.3 points ahead of his teammates Connor Van Loo (Sr., Freeland, Mich.) and Buradagunta, who both posted 14.05 scores. Competing in his first ECAC Championship, Ian Dinmore (Jr., Odenton, Md.) aced his showing with a 13.95 result. Hickey tied for sixth place with Springfield's Dominic Ramalho with matching 13.25s.
 
In the all-around competition, Drake came in first with a cumulative total of 80.35 points. He finished 3.1 points ahead of Ramalho, who posted a 77.25.
 
After the meet, Simons was recognized as the ECAC's Coach of the Year.
 
Navy will continue its run of postseason action at the NCAA Championship at Penn State University on April 14-15.