The mood was festive before Saturday's Senior Night meet at Cliff Keen Arena.

Michigan gymnasts grinned at their friends in the stands during warmups and parents hugged gleefully. As the night began, nine seniors walked onto the floor with their parents and accepted plaques from tearful Michigan coach Kurt Golder.

After his usual rendition of the national anthem, sophomore Ben Baldus-Strauss led the crowd in singing “Happy Birthday” to legendary coach Newt Loken, who turned 90 on Feb. 27. Former co-captain Andrew Elkind, whose own Senior Night in 2007 featured a Michigan victory over Illinois, joined his old teammates on the bench for the meet.

But the atmosphere deflated just a few hours later as No. 5 Michigan fell to No. 4 Illinois 354.90-353.90.

Though the Wolverines endured a tough final rotation on high bar, pommel horse was crucial in the loss. Even for hit routines — only one Wolverine actually fell off the apparatus — Michigan received uncharacteristically low scores. The Wolverines had taken a lead after opening on floor, but losing in pommel horse by almost two points, they could never quite catch up to the Fighting Illini.

“We probably should reassess the (horse) lineup, because some of us just can’t get the scores we need to be getting,” said Baldus-Strauss, who won the floor title and hit all his sets. “We can’t have hit routines like that and just go so low. We clearly lost the meet on horse alone, in my opinion.”

Despite trailing by 1.4 points after two events, Michigan began putting together a comeback on the still rings and vault, where it earned season-high team scores.

After a missed opening set, senior Joe Catrambone got Michigan back on track on the rings, smoothly executing his revamped routine to notch a season-high score of 14.75. His teammates built on the hit. Senior Phil Goldberg and sophomore Chris Cameron posted matching 15.35 scores, the highest scores any Wolverine has achieved this season on rings.

And the momentum carried into vault. On the event that used to cost Michigan two to three points in start value alone, no Wolverine scored lower than a 15.30. In fact, four Michigan gymnasts set season highs, with senior Ralph Rosso and junior co-captain David Chan landing high-value handspring double front vaults.

Going into the final two rotations, Michigan sat less than a point behind Illinois. On parallel bars, senior John Sawicki, who's rarely been called upon in his career, and fifth-year senior Paul Woodward got Michigan started with emotional hits. Woodward, who also had a clean pommel horse set, said he felt it was the first complete meet he’s put together all year.

But with Rosso and all-around champion Cameron as the only two hits in the next four sets, Michigan was shaky going into high bar.

The Wolverines tried to regroup before the final event, bellowing, “Our house!” But the Illini were already swarming. A chain in front of the Illinois bench area was no match for the Illini gymnasts, who slipped past it to gather near the events and cheer their teammates on.

Baldus-Strauss and junior Mel Santander started the Wolverines with two hits, but it wasn’t enough. Santander eventually won the event but Illinois steamrolled to the finish, and Michigan stumbled, suffering major mistakes on its final four routines.

“We lost the meet,” said senior Scott Bregman, who earned a 14.80 in his final floor set at Keen. “They didn’t take it from us.”

It certainly wasn’t the Senior Night the Wolverines had dreamed of. But the seniors will have one more chance to go out on a high note at home. Michigan will host the Big Ten Championships the first weekend in April.

“They took away our Senior Night,” Goldberg said. “If your emotions aren’t coming into play after that, I don’t know, you might not be a living being. … This is it. This is our season.”