BATON ROUGE – Many of the nation’s premier track and field programs will descend on the Nutter Field House in Lexington, Kentucky, this weekend as the LSU Track & Field teams will put their early-season form to the test against an NCAA Championships caliber field at the prestigious Rod McCravy Memorial Track & Field Meet running Friday and Saturday.
It marks the first of two trips to the University of Kentucky this season as the Nutter Field House will also serve as the host site for the 2015 SEC Indoor Track & Field Championships to be held Feb. 27-28.
Friday’s action at the Rod McCravy Memorial Track & Field Meet is set to get underway at 9 a.m. CT with the start of the two-day multi-events, followed by the first field events of the afternoon at 2 p.m. and the debut events on the track at 5:20 p.m. The meet continues Saturday with the conclusion of the multi-events at 9 a.m. CT, followed by the field events at 10 a.m. and track events at 11 a.m.
Fans will be able to watch the Tigers and Lady Tigers in action during Saturday’s finale at this year’s Rod McCravy Memorial as the second day of the competition will feature live streaming video on the SEC Network+ at http://www.espn3.com/. The coverage will also feature highlights of Friday’s events at the Nutter Field House.
Fans can also follow all of the action in Lexington by following @LSUTrackField on Twitter at http://twitter.com/lsutrackfield and liking LSU Track & Field on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/lsutrackfield.
LSU is among 15 universities scheduled to compete this weekend with a combined 16 nationally-ranked teams between the two genders in the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association NCAA Division I Preseason Indoor Team Top 25 Rankings released back on Jan. 6. The No. 10-ranked Tigers join No. 1 Florida, No. 2 Oregon, No. 3 Arkansas, No. 8 Texas, No. 11 Georgia, No. 20 Florida State and No. 24 Ohio State on the men’s side; while the Lady Tigers join No. 1 Florida, No. 3 Oregon, No. 4 Georgia, No. 5 Texas, No. 6 Kentucky, No. 7 Arkansas, No. 9 Florida State and No. 24 Missouri on the women’s side.
Rounding out the field are the men of Kentucky and Missouri, the women of Ohio State and both the men’s and women’s teams from Baylor, Illinois, Miami, Southern California and Virginia this weekend.
The Tigers and Lady Tigers are looking to continue their red-hot start to the 2015 indoor season as they have turned in 10 performances that rank among the Top 10 of the NCAA rankings through two meets this season at the LSU Indoor Invitational held at the Carl Maddox Field House in Baton Rouge on Jan. 9 and the Auburn Indoor Invitational held at the Birmingham Crossplex last Saturday.
That includes four No. 1-ranked performances in the NCAA to this point in the season, including senior Tori Bliss with an indoor-school-record throw of 57 feet, 2 ¾ inches in the shot put, sophomore Morgan Schuetz at 2 minutes, 6.32 seconds in the 800 meters, the Tigers’ seasonal-best time of 3:07.65 in the 4×400-meter relay and the Lady Tigers’ seasonal-best time of 11:35.51 in the distance medley relay.
Bliss owns the three best single marks in the NCAA this season with throws of 57-2 ¾, 56-8 ¾ and 56-4 ½ as she will look to win her third-straight shot put title to open her senior season. Schuetz, who is also the nation’s No. 3-ranked miler with a season-opening time of 4:43.65 two weeks ago, will line up in the 800 meters for the second-straight week after winning the event with a lifetime best of 2:06.32 in Birmingham a week ago.
Following Schuetz in the No. 5 spot in the NCAA’s 800-meter rankings this season is junior Andria Aguilar, who has run a lifetime best of 2:07.44 in the event in 2015. Aguilar will line up in the mile this weekend.
The Lady Tigers also feature three of the nation’s fastest 60-meter sprinters in the early going as freshman Mikiah Brisco is tied for No. 6 nationally with a time of 7.30 seconds and sophomore Jada Martin and freshman Aleia Hobbs are tied with one another for No. 10 nationally with matching times of 7.34 through two weeks of the season. While Brisco will only line up in the 60-meter dash during the meet, Martin and Hobbs will each double in both the 60 meters and 200 meters in a stacked field at Kentucky this weekend.
Another Top 10 performer nationally who is scheduled to compete this weekend is Tiger junior Cyril Grayson, who opened with the NCAA’s No. 9-ranked time in the 400 meters at 47.37 a week ago.
The Rod McCravy Memorial Track & Field Meet is certainly one of the nation’s leading competitions during the indoor season, and annually features some of the nation’s top performances throughout the campaign. In 2014, athletes turned in four world-leading, eight NCAA-leading and 47 NCAA Top 10 marks along with four school records in two days of action at the Nutter Field House.
After competing at the Rod McCravy Memorial this weekend, the Tigers and Lady Tigers will travel to the site of this year’s NCAA Division I Indoor Track & Field Championships as they travel to Fayetteville, Arkansas, to compete at the two-day Razorback Invitational being held Jan. 30-31 at the Randal Tyson Track Center at the University of Arkansas.