BATON ROUGE – The LSU Track & Field teams will have one final opportunity to prepare for the start of the championship season on Friday afternoon when they play host to the LSU Twilight at the Carl Maddox Field House that is scheduled to begin at 2:30 p.m. CT with the first field events of the day and 3:30 p.m. with the first events on the track.
The LSU Twilight will serve as the as the team’s final tune up for the championship season as they will compete at the 2016 SEC Indoor Track & Field Championships in Fayetteville, Arkansas, next weekend.
A full slate of events will be on offer for fans attending the meet as the action kicks off with the field events at 2:30 p.m. CT followed by the first preliminary races on the track at 3:30 p.m. The first finals on the track are set to run at 4:20 p.m., while the competition runs through the men’s distance medley relay that is scheduled to end at approximately 7:20 p.m. on Friday night.
Fans of the LSU Track & Field program can receive live updates of the Tigers and Lady Tigers competing at the LSU Twilight by following @LSUTrackField on both Twitter at http://twitter.com/lsutrackfield and Instagram at http://instagram.com/lsutrackfield and also by liking LSU Track & Field on Facebook http://facebook.com/lsutrackfield.
LSU’s athletes are ranked among the nation’s elite as the Tigers are No. 4 on the men’s side and Lady Tigers are No. 22 on the women’s side in the latest U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Top 25 power rankings released on Monday afternoon. This is the first week in which only performances achieved during the 2016 indoor season are factored into the USTFCCCA’s ranking calculation.
As it does each season, the LSU Twilight meet features a Louisiana flavor with Loyola-New Orleans, New Orleans, Nicholls State, Northwestern State, Southeastern Louisiana, Southern-New Orleans and Tulane making the trip to Baton Rouge on Friday. Rounding out the field from outside the state are Rice, Samford, Southern Miss and both Hinds and Meridian community colleges.
A number of Tigers and Lady Tigers will be looking to improve their qualifying marks for the NCAA Championships during Friday’s competition as they seek a Top 16 ranking nationally in their respective events.
Three Lady Tigers already ranking among the nation’s Top 16 in their events will look to solidify their NCAA qualification at the LSU Twilight as junior Nataliyah Friar steps onto the long jump and triple jump runways and sophomores Mikiah Brisco and Daeshon Gordon will both race the 60-meter hurdles.
Brisco is tied for the No. 14 spot nationally with a seasonal-best and personal-best time of 8.20, while Gordon follows at No. 16 with a best of 8.22 on the season. Friar is poised to qualify for the NCAA Championships in two events as she enters the meet tied for the No. 15 spot in the rankings with a mark of 20 feet, 9 inches in the long jump while also ranking No. 18 nationally with a jump of 42-9 in the triple jump.
Two Tigers also enter the meet ranked among the NCAA’s Top 20 while looking to improve their position for NCAA Championships qualification as junior Johnnie Jackson ranks No. 17 nationally with a throw of 69-3 ¼ in the weight throw and fellow junior Tremayne Acy lines up in a tie for the No. 20 spot nationally with a top time of 6.69 on the season.
Friday’s meet will also be headlined by the likes of junior All-Americans Jada Martin and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake along with freshmen Donte Jackson, Kortnei Johnson and Rachel Misher all running the 60-meter dash, as well as seniors Patrick Geers and David Collins joining Jackson in the men’s weight throw and newly-minted 17-foot vaulter Cameron Robichaux competing in the men’s pole vault.
Not only will the teams play host to the LSU Twilight on Friday, but LSU Track & Field will also make its presence felt at Notre Dame’s Alex Wilson Invitational being held at the Loftus Sports Center on Saturday.
With the 12 fastest relay teams in both the 4×400-meter relay and distance medley relay earning NCAA qualification at the end of conference championship weekend, the highlight of Saturday’s action at Notre Dame is sure to be the performance of LSU’s distance medley relay teams that head to South Bend, Indiana, in position for a qualifying performance.
The Lady Tigers already rank as the ninth-fastest women’s DMR in the country in 2016 with their school-record time of 11 minutes, 16.92 seconds from the Razorback Invitational, as freshman Hollie Parker, junior Travia Jones, sophomore Hannah Deworth and junior Morgan Schuetz are set to race at Notre Dame. The Tigers, who rank No. 16 nationally with a seasonal-best time of 9:42.56, will run with a team of junior Blair Henderson, senior Cyril Grayson, sophomore Jack Wilkes and freshman Dajour Braxton.
While also teaming on LSU’s distance medley relay teams at Notre Dame, each athlete will also line up in their individual events on Saturday with Grayson and Jones both lining up in the 400 meters; Henderson, Wilkes, Deworth, Parker and Schuetz each lining up in the 800 meters; and Braxton running the mile.
After wrapping up an exciting weekend of competition at LSU and Notre Dame, the Tigers and Lady Tigers will kick off their championship season next weekend with a return trip to Fayetteville, Arkansas, for the SEC’s Indoor Championships running from Feb. 26-27 at the Randal Tyson Track Center at the University of Arkansas. It will mark LSU’s third appearance this season at the Randal Tyson Track Center while they also competed during the Razorback and Tyson invitationals in recent weeks.