BATON ROUGE — The LSU track and field team will face its final test before next weekend’s Southeastern Conference Indoor Championships this Friday, when eight teams join LSU at the Carl Maddox Field House for the LSU Twilight.
Field events will get underway at 3 p.m. while track events start at 6 p.m.
“We’ll rest some people this weekend because we’re coming off two very difficult, very demanding competitions and we have the SEC meet next week,” said Henry. “There are still a lot of people who need the work heading into next weekend, however, and this meet becomes very important in that sense.”
Joining LSU will be Ole Miss, Louisiana-Lafayette, UNO, Alcorn State, Florida A&M, Troy State, Tulane and Hinds Community College.
LSU is coming off a tough two-week stretch in which they competed at both Florida and Arkansas and responded with 18 NCAA qualifying marks and three NCAA leading marks.
Freshman Muna Lee started her ascent to the top of the NCAA rankings in Gainesville two weeks ago with a national leading 23.44-second time in the 200-meter dash. She then lowered that mark this past weekend in Fayetteville with an LSU freshman record time of 23.17.
Lee ranks seventh in the nation in the 60-meter dash and will try to improve upon her NCAA provisional time of 7.37 when she heads a field that includes LSU All-American Sa’Donna Thornton who ranks 16th in the nation in the event.
Myra Combs has already provisionally qualified in three events, posting NCAA marks in the long jump, 200 and 400-meter dashes. Combs will try and improve upon her provisional status in the long jump on Friday. Combs ranks ninth in the nation with a mark of 20 feet 5 inches.
The Lady Tigers will look to make an impact in the 60-meter hurdles, as NCAA provisional qualifier Lolo Jones headlines the field for the event, while teammate April Sams has been consistent and has flirted with the provisional standard through the first four weeks.
The men’s 60-meter hurdles figures to be a strong event, as NCAA provisional qualifier Greg Scott will look to move up among the national leaders while being challenged by newcomer Adrian Mayes, a member of the Tiger football team, who made a solid debut at Arkansas last weekend.
Following the LSU Twilight, both teams will head to Lexington, Ky., next weekend for the SEC Indoor Championships. The Tigers finished second a year ago, while the Lady Tigers finished fourth and will try and regain the title they held in 1998 and 1999.