BATON ROUGE – While already ranking among the NCAA’s fastest 60-meter sprinters when she arrived at the Carl Maddox Field House for Friday’s LSU Twilight meet, LSU’s sophomore All-American Mikiah Brisco emerged as one of the fastest 60-meter hurdlers as well when she took the title with a personal-best time of 8.06 seconds in the final.
Brisco hurdled to back-to-back personal bests as she followed the fastest time in the preliminary round at 8.12 with a winning time of 8.06 in the final for the fourth-fastest time in the NCAA this season.
Tiger junior Johnnie Jackson also turned in a performance during this year’s LSU Twilight meet to move himself into the qualifying positions for the NCAA Division I Indoor Track & Field Championships as he posted a big PR of 70 feet, 5 ¾ inches to win the men’s weight throw title with the No. 12-ranked throw nationally.
In what proved to be an impressive home finale for the Tigers and Lady Tigers this indoor season, they were among 17 athletes setting 18 personal bests in the competition in the team’s final tune up ahead of their trip to the Randal Tyson Track Center at the University of Arkansas for the SEC Indoor Track & Field Championships next weekend.
Brisco shined brightest as she moved from the No. 14 spot in the national rankings to No. 4 in the hurdles while finishing less than one tenth of a second off of the NCAA leader of 7.97 held by Michigan’s Cindy Ofili.
After advancing to the final with a personal best of 8.12 in qualifying, Brisco became the seventh-fastest sprint hurdler in school history with her winning run of 8.06 as she took charge of the race early on and wrapped up the title ahead of Raven Clay in second place and sophomore teammate Daeshon Gordon in third place with matching times of 8.10 in the final.
Gordon became one of the NCAA’s Top 10 hurdlers in her own right as her bronze-medal-winning run of 8.10 smashed her previous personal best of 8.20 in the event and moved her into the No. 6 spot on the national list this season. Like Brisco, she also cracked LSU’s all-time Top 10 performance list for the first time in her career as the 10th-fastest hurdler indoors in school history.
But it was Brisco writing the headlines with a top-five time nationally after entering the meet as the NCAA’s No. 6-ranked sprinter in the 60-meter dash with a seasonal-best time of 7.25 to her credit.
“I’ve been wanting to do both the hurdles and the 60 since last year because I did them in high school,” Brisco said of performing in both events this season. “Last year, I realized it was a different level of competition in college, so I had to kind of focus on one race last year. This year, I knew I could run the hurdles again because I’ve already got a fast 60 (meters). We’ve been working on getting to this point all season.
“I feel confident going into SECs next week and doing both races. I feel like I can run a pretty good time in the prelims and then even faster in the finals. I actually like hurdling more than I like running the open 60 or the open 100 because I can focus my attention on each hurdle during the race. When running the open races, sometimes I think too much. With the hurdles there, I have something to focus on and keep me going.”
Four Lady Tigers actually set personal bests in the final of the women’s 60-meter hurdles on Friday as senior All-American Chanice Chase finished fourth overall with a time of 8.23 and sophomore Danielle Phillips raced to a pair of personal bests of 8.41 in the prelims and 8.35 in the final for fifth place. Chase finished on the cusp of NCAA qualification as the No. 17-ranked hurdler in the country this season. Phillips later added an indoor PR in the long jump when she jumped 19-9 ½ for third place in the women’s final.
Just as he has done for much of the 2016 indoor season, Jackson got the Tigers off to a fast start in the very first event of the meet with a career-best performance to win the men’s weight throw crown.
Jackson came up just short of his personal best of 69-3 ¼ entering the meet with a throw of 69-2 in the opening round to grab the early lead in the competition. He then added more than one foot to his lifetime best in the second round with the NCAA’s No. 12-ranked throw this season at 70-5 ¾ that finished more than two feet in front of Southeastern Louisiana’s Jonathan Kinchen (68-3 ¼) for the win.
Jackson, who now ranks No. 3 on LSU’s all-time indoor performance list in the men’s weight throw, has continued to raise the bar throughout his debut season with the Tigers while setting PRs of 67-2 ¾ in his debut on Jan. 8 at the Purple Tiger Invitational, 67-11 ¾ in a runner-up finish at the Razorback Invitational on Jan. 29 and 69-3 ¼ to win his first NCAA Division I title at the LSU High Performance Meet a week ago.
The former two-time junior college national champion is hitting his stride heading into the championship series after also throwing 68-6 ½ in the third round, 67-10 ¾ in the fourth round and 69-1 ½ in the fifth round.
“I had a great week of practice this week, and I felt great getting up this morning and then coming here and going through warm ups,” Jackson said. “I didn’t want to throw too much (in warm ups). It’s an issue I’ve kind of had before, getting a lot of throws in before a competition. So, I felt really good going in. I wasn’t as timid as I’ve been in the past.
“I was able to get a good first throw in that was really solid, and then my second throw, I felt more comfortable where I could really concentrate on my ending. It just felt great to be able to get a PR today. There’s not a lot that separates those guys going to nationals, so I knew if I could PR even just a little bit that I could put myself in a good position to be in that Top 16.”
Tiger senior Patrick Geers came up just one inch short of his seasonal best and personal best mark in the weight throw this season when he threw 66-10 ½ on his fifth throw of Friday’s event. Fellow senior David Collins rounded out the Tigers competing in the event in fourth place with a series-best of 65-4 ¼ in the fifth round.
After Jackson put himself in qualifying position for the NCAA Championship in the weight throw, junior All-American Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake and freshman two-sport standout Donte Jackson took a step toward their own NCAA qualification in what proved to be the fastest 60-meter race by the Tigers this season with both crossing the finish line with personal bests in the final.
Mitchell-Blake followed a heat-winning personal best of 6.68 in the preliminary round with a new lifetime best of 6.65 for second place in the final as he was edged at the line by former LSU All-American and Zimbabwe international Gabriel Mvumvure (6.64). Jackson bagged the bronze medal in his first collegiate final as an LSU Tiger as he crossed the finish line in 6.66 for third place overall.
Theirs were two of the NCAA’s fastest times this season as Mitchell-Blake came away in a tie for the No. 14 spot nationally followed by Jackson in a tie for No. 17 nationally in the event in 2016. They also became two of the top-10 60-meter sprinters in school history as Mitchell-Blake’s 6.65 tied for No. 4 and Jackson’s 6.66 tied for No. 6 on LSU’s all-time indoor performance list for the event.
Junior All-American Tremayne Acy also made his comeback from an early-season injury at the LSU Twilight to place fifth in the men’s 60-meter dash after running 6.77 in the qualifying round and 6.75 in the final.
Friday’s LSU Twilight also saw three Lady Tigers clock personal bests in the women’s 60-meter dash, led by junior All-American Rushell Harvey running back-to-back PRs of 7.37 in the prelims and 7.34 in the final to claim third place overall. Freshman Kortnei Johnson followed in fourth place in the final at 7.40 after running a 7.36 personal best in qualifying, while senior Kiersten Duncan added a career best of 7.45 in the prelims.
Also lining up in the women’s 60-meter final were sophomore Aleia Hobbs with consecutive seasonal bests of 7.40 on the day for fifth place and junior Jada Martin with a time of 7.49 for sixth place.
Other LSU athletes taking home event titles at this year’s LSU Twilight were senior Shanice Hall with a clearance of 5-8 ¾ to win the women’s high jump crown, sophomore Keterra Harris with a time of 56.39 to take the women’s 400 meters and sophomore DC Lipani with a run of 8:48.52 to claim the men’s 3,000 meters. Harris’ time of 56.39 in the 400 meters converted to an indoor PR of 55.65 on a banked track.
Also setting personal bests on the day were sophomore Marvalyn Vernon (56-1) in the women’s weight throw, freshman Chadd Burns (16-6 ½) in the men’s pole vault, freshman Erika Lewis (2:13.22) in the 800 meters, freshman Kaitlyn Walker (5-3) in the women’s high jump and LSU’s freshman duo of Rebecca Little (10:18.39) and Monica Guillot (10:20.80) in the women’s 3k.
“We feel like our teams are positioned pretty well going to SECs next week,” said LSU head coach Dennis Shaver. “We have a number of athletes who are comfortably within the qualifying spots for NCAAs at this time, but still many others right on the bubble who are going to benefit from a highly-competitive meet like we’re going to see next week.”
With the LSU Twilight now in the books, this weekend’s action continues Saturday as selected Tigers and Lady Tigers have made the trip to South Bend, Indiana, to compete at Notre Dame’s Alex Wilson Invitational set to get underway at 11:50 a.m. CT at the Loftus Sports Center. They will then kick off the championship season with a return trip to Fayetteville, Arkansas, next weekend, where they will compete at the 2016 SEC Indoor Track & Field Championships running Feb. 26-27 at the Randal Tyson Track Center.