THORNTON >> The Niwot gymnastics team showed up to the Class 4A state championships on Saturday wearing shirts that read “We Better” on them.

That statement is a simplified version of a team-centric, forward-thinking motto that developed over the course of the 2024 fall season. That season ended on Saturday at Thornton High School, and the ending was exactly the one the Cougars had worked towards — their first team championship since 2018.

“It feels like a long time,” Cougars head coach Marisa Purcell said.

“Last year, coming in fourth and coming in just by fourth-tenths under second place, we came into this year wanting to make sure that we get to where we want to be and how we do that. Our motto this year was ‘We Better’ because the girls kept talking about how it wasn’t about ‘I’ and it was about ‘We.’ We just kept trying to get better, and we did it together.

“We watched them continue to fight through that all season and always continue to just get better every single week so that when this day came, we were ready to compete for a state championship.”

The Cougars’ team score of 180.75 was the top finish of the day on Saturday. Standley Lake was runner-up with a team score of 176.200.

Niwot scored 45.275 on vault, a meet-high 44.825 on bars, another meet-high 44.875 on beam and 46.000 on floor. The Cougars are now third all-time with seven team titles.

Cougars sophomore Evie Saunders won the 4A all-around competition with a combined score of 37.100, outscoring runner-up Merrick Nakatsu of Standley Lake, who posted a score of 36.550. Saunders had the highest score of 9.700 on beam, which was a season high for her; finished second (9.500) on floor; was eighth (9.075) on vault; and placed 12th (8.875) on bars.“I think this was one of the best meets that we’ve had,” Saunders said. “We really just fed off of each other’s energy. It’s really hard to do such a long meet, and I think we just really pumped each other up and did it together. I’m really proud of everyone on our team. We just did so great.”

Also for Niwot, Lilly O’Neill — who had the fourth-best score (9.100) on bars, the third-best score (9.425) on floor and the fifth-best score (9.350) on beam — was third in the all-around with a score of 36.525.

Kylee Schlepp, who had the day’s highest score (9.425) on vault, scored 35.650 to place 10th.

Chloe Pereira was 43rd in the all-around with a score of 26.525.