BATON ROUGE – After sweeping SEC titles in the 60-meter dash and 60-meter hurdles and winning the Cliff Harper Trophy as the joint top point scorer at the SEC Indoor Championships just over one week ago, LSU’s sophomore Mikiah Brisco was honored Monday as the SEC Women’s Indoor Runner of the Year in a vote of the league’s head coaches.
Brisco tied Tennessee’s standout distance runner Chelsea Blaase as the leading point scorer on the women’s side while totaling 20 points to help the Lady Tigers earn a second-place team finish in the meet.
With her performance, Brisco became the first SEC athlete in 24 seasons since Florida’s Michelle Freeman in 1991 and 1992 to sweep conference championships in the 60-meter dash and 60-meter hurdles, or 55-meter equivalent, at the SEC Indoor Track & Field Championships. She also became the first Lady Tiger to win the Cliff Harper Trophy as the meet’s leading point scorer since Kimberlyn Duncan in 2013.
A Baton Rouge native and product of local Baton Rouge Magnet High School, Brisco emerged as one of the stars of the meet and one of the NCAA’s leading performers while running personal bests in both finals in her sweep of SEC Indoor titles on Feb. 27. Within minutes of winning the 60 hurdles with a personal best of 8.05, she clocked 7.18 in the 60 meters to be crowned an SEC Champion for the first time in her career.
Brisco even beat Florida’s NCAA leader Shayla Sanders to the finish line in the 60-meter final to complete her SEC double as her personal-best time of 7.18 put her No. 2 in the NCAA rankings behind Sanders’ 7.17. With a PR of 8.05 in the final of the 60 hurdles, Brisco became the No. 5-ranked collegian in the event this season.
She scored 20 of the team’s 67 points over two days of competition at Arkansas’ Randal Tyson Track Center to lead the Lady Tigers to their best finish since they also placed second at the SEC Indoor meet in 2013.
Brisco will compete in both events at the NCAA Division I Indoor Track & Field Championships later this week as she is among 14 entries for LSU’s teams set to line up in the 2016 indoor season finale running both Friday and Saturday at the Birmingham, Crossplex in Birmingham, Alabama. The Tigers and Lady Tigers have each qualified seven entries into the meet beginning this week.
“Mikiah has had a great season to this point, and had one of those breakout SEC Championship meets we see one of our athletes have from time to time where she’s now being recognized on a national level for those accomplishments,” said LSU head coach Dennis Shaver. “She’s a great student and a great athlete, and deserves any recognition she receives by the kind of person she is and how hard she works.”
Monday’s announcement by the Southeastern Conference of its annual indoor awards also officially recognized all SEC Indoor Championship medalists as All-SEC performers based on their event finish.
Brisco was among four SEC Champion athletes for LSU to earn First-Team All-SEC recognition as she was joined on the list by event winners Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake in the men’s 200-meter dash, Jordan Moore for the men’s 60-meter hurdles and Morgan Schuetz in the women’s 800-meter run. Schuetz also picked up Second-Team All-SEC honors as the anchor leg of LSU’s women’s distance medley relay team that raced to the SEC’s Indoor silver medal along with fellow All-SEC runners Chanice Chase, Hannah Deworth and Hollie Parker.
SEC Indoor silver and bronze medalists were named Second-Team All-SEC performers for the 2016 indoor season, as Lady Tiger sophomore Daeshon Gordon joined the women’s DMR as a conference runner-up with a second-place finish to Brisco in the 60-meter hurdles. Seniors David Collins (weight throw) and Fitzroy Dunkley (400 meters) and junior Jada Martin (200 meters) were also included as SEC bronze medalists.
One Lady Tiger was even named to the SEC All-Freshman Team as the top freshman finisher in her event as Kortnei Johnson clocked a personal-best time of 7.33 to place sixth overall in the women’s 60-meter dash.
2016 SEC Indoor Track & Field Awards
Men’s Coach of the Year: Chris Bucknam, Arkansas
Men’s Runner of the Year: Christian Coleman, Tennessee
Men’s Field Athlete of the Year: Jarrion Lawson, Arkansas
Men’s Freshman Runner of the Year: Donavan Brazier, Texas A&M
Men’s Freshman Field Athlete of the Year: Jacob Wooten, Texas A&M
Men’s Scholar-Athlete of the Year: Jarrion Lawson, Arkansas
Women’s Coach of the Year: Lance Harter, Arkansas
Women’s Runner of the Year: Mikiah Brisco, LSU
Women’s Field Athlete of the Year: Keturah Orji, Georgia
Women’s Freshman Runner of the Year: Diamond Spaulding, Texas A&M
Women’s Freshman Field Athlete of the Year: Lexi Weeks, Arkansas
Women’s Co-Scholar-Athletes of the Year: Taylor Ellis-Watson, Arkansas; Cornelia Griesche, Mississippi State