With this Utah gymnastics team, it's simply all about getting better each meet.

Friday night in the Huntsman Center, two injured and young in-state clubs, Southern Utah and Utah State, could do nothing to push the second-ranked Utes, but it mattered little. Just like it hadn't mattered that Washington didn't push them the week before in Seattle.

The Utes pushed themselves again, scoring 197.20, the second-highest total of the season and second straight 197-plus score (197.1 at UW), compared to a season-low 193.10 for Southern Utah and the second-lowest score of the season for the Aggies, 189.65, who could only field five competitors on floor with their awful injury situation.

"I do think that they feel that there's something special about this group, and they seem to be gaining more and more confidence each week," said Utah coach Greg Marsden, who has the depth to make gymnasts push themselves to break into the lineups.

"It doesn't seem to matter who the opponent is," said Marsden. "They've concentrated on getting better and being who they are. And in gymnastics, that's the best thing athletes can do."

Now the Utes give themselves another test, one that all-around winner senior Ashley Postell — 39.75 her third-highest career score, second-best of the season — said she's never experienced.

That's a meet just two days after.

Utah moves on to face UCLA Sunday at 3 p.m. MST in a dual meet vs. the No. 9 Bruins in Pauley Pavilion.

It's a rare double weekend. The Utes hardly ever do that, "but it's not all bad," said Marsden. Many teams do schedule back-to-back meets to give their athletes a taste of what it's like at nationals, when teams that make the Super Six finals compete two days in a row.

Utah and Postell have done that, of course, but this also involves traveling, going from a vibrant house of 12,963 to one that may see a thousand or less.

The Utes very much want to win at UCLA and look at it as a chance to compete on the road against a team that they will likely meet in the NCAA championships.

"We'll have to be at our very best there. I'm looking forward to Sunday just to see how we'll handle that," said Marsden.

UCLA had a meet at Arizona on Friday.

Utah used several of the upgrades it put in last week at Washington, Postell and Kyndal Robarts doing their double Arabians, Kristina Baskett doing 1 1/2 vault and her full-in/double-pike floor routine, which she did well for a 9.9 against what had been very tight floor judging. Postell totaled 9.925 on floor.

"I've finally figured out the landings," Baskett said of her floor, on which she's gone out of bounds in past meets a couple of times.