BATON ROUGE — For their outstanding performance at the New Balance Collegiate Invitational this past weekend, juniors Trindon Holliday, Will Coppage and LaTavia Thomas each earned SEC Athlete of the Week honors as announced by the league office Tuesday.
Holliday burned up the track at the Armory Track and Field Center in New York en route to SEC Male Runner of the Week honors as he matched his seasonal best in the 60-meter dash with a time of 6.56 seconds to win the event title on Friday night.
Not only did Holliday match his seasonal best, but his performance also equals the meet record of 6.56 set by former Tennessee star Justin Gatlin back in 2002.
Coppage has been named this week’s SEC Male Field Athlete of the Week following a career best performance in the long jump at the New Balance Collegiate Invitational. He catapulted himself to the No. 1 spot in the NCAA this season by winning the event title with a new personal best and national-leading jump of 25 feet, 7 ? inches on Friday night.
Coppage, who is now a strong provisional qualifier for the NCAA Indoor Championships, is only the second Tiger to win the long jump in the nine-year history of the New Balance Collegiate Invitational as he joins LSU great John Moffitt, who set a meet record of 27-1 ? in 2004.
Thomas was named the SEC Female Runner of the Week after setting a new indoor personal best and NCAA-leading time in her first 800-meter race of the 2009 season.
The reigning NCAA Indoor champion showed the nation just why she is the favorite to repeat this season as she broke her own meet record and set a new personal best of 2 minutes, 4.54 seconds to won the meet’s 800-meter title for the second-straight season. She becomes the first Lady Tiger to automatically qualify for the NCAA Indoor Championships in March.
Not only that, but Thomas anchored the Lady Tigers’ 4×400-meter relay team to victory with a lightning-fast 52.66-second split. For her performance, Thomas was named the Most Outstanding Female Performer of the meet, marking the second year in a row that a Lady Tiger has received the award at one of the nation’s premier collegiate meets of the indoor season.
LSU will be back in action this weekend as it makes its annual trip to Fayetteville, Ark, to square off against the nation’s best at the Tyson Invitational beginning Friday at the Randal Tyson Track Center.