AUSTIN, Texas – Not even a 45-minute weather delay to start Friday’s morning session could slow down the Lady Tigers in 4×100-meter relay qualifying as they stepped onto the track in the second heat and raced to the fastest time of the day at 44.16 seconds to advance to Saturday’s final at the 89th Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays.
LSU followed a heat-winning time of 44.37 by Texas A&M in the first section with a winning time of their own at 44.16 in the second to top qualifying on blustery Friday morning at Mike A. Myers Stadium.
Junior Rushell Harvey and freshman Kortnei Johnson returned to their home state of Texas and set the pace for the Lady Tigers on the first two legs before junior Jada Martin and sophomore Mikiah Brisco brought the baton home in 44.16 ahead of North Texas in second place in the second heat with a time of 45.80.
The Lady Tigers earned the No. 1 seed in the final with their performance with Texas A&M turning in the second-fastest time of the day with an opening run of 44.37 in the first heat. Texas wrapped up the day’s prelim by winning the sixth heat with the third-fastest time of the day at 44.45, while Purdue (44.71), Miami (44.81), Baylor (44.86), Arkansas (45.11), Oklahoma (45.27) and Clemson (45.54) rounded out the qualifiers.
The Tigers also earned their lane in the men’s sprint relay final to run Saturday as they posted the third-fastest time of the day at 40.34 in the qualifying round of the Clyde Littlefield Men’s 4×100-Meter Relay.
Junior Jordan Moore, freshman Jaron Flournoy, junior Tinashe Mutanga and junior Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake combined to win the fifth qualifying heat in 40.34 ahead of Utah State in second place with a run of 41.03. In six heats, the Tigers were third behind Texas (40.07) and Arkansas (40.26), while Texas Tech (40.39), TCU (40.39), Clemson (40.40), Texas A&M (40.56) and Houston (40.76) also advanced.
“We were really running in some adverse conditions this morning, but I thought our athletes responded very well,” said LSU head coach Dennis Shaver. “It’s only the second time we’ve run the (4×100-meter) relay this season, so we’re just trying to develop some chemistry with both of those teams early on. We’ll look forward to another chance to run tomorrow.”
Junior All-American Nataliyah Friar cracked the Top 5 of the national rankings with her season-opening performance in the triple jump as she soared to a series-best 42 feet, 6 inches in the fifth round to place third. She emerged as the No. 5-ranked triple jumper nationally early in the season while following Texas’ Asa Garcia (43-7 ¼) and Texas Tech’s Viershanie Latham (42-7 ½) in the women’s university division.
Friar took third place into the final with a wind-aided jump of 41-11 ½ (+3.8) on her first attempt, and solidified the third spot in the standings with a wind-legal 42-6 (+1.8) in the fifth round of jumps.
A second weather delay during the morning session ended Danielle Phillips‘ title challenge in the B section of the women’s long jump as she sat in second place with her fifth-round jump of 19-4 (+1.9) as the event was suspended with just one round to go. She passed her final jump following a two-hour delay as Texas Tech’s Amani Nesmith topped the standings with a wind-aided 19-11 ½.
Phillips also lined up in the qualifying round of the women’s 100-meter hurdles for her first event of the day as she finished in 20th place overall with a time of 14.09 (+1.7) for fifth place in her section.
The championship division of the women’s javelin was also suspended in the second round of throws by weather after junior All-American Rebekah Wales and senior Annie Simoneaux opened with their best throw of the day. Wales won the bronze medal with her first-round throw of 170-6 that held up for third place, while Simoneaux was just two inches shy of her personal best with a throw of 165-4 for sixth place.
Neither Lady Tiger was able to improve on her opening throw of the competition after warming up for a second time and restarting the event in the second round. Wales managed to post her second-best mark for her series at 157-9 in the sixth round, and Simoneaux followed her opener with a throw of 147-4 in the second round following the restart.
Senior Chanice Chase, junior Ka’Lynn Jupiter and sophomore Kymber Payne each advanced to the final of the women’s 400-meter hurdles in Thursday’s qualifying round, but were scratched from the final Friday when events in the evening session were pushed back late into the night. The Tigers and Lady Tigers also scratched their sprint medley relay teams from the evening session with events running late.
Saturday’s finale at the 89th Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays is scheduled to get underway at 11 a.m. CT with the first field events of the day followed by the first relay finals on the track beginning at 12:05 p.m. Sprint relay finals will take center stage as the Tigers and Lady Tigers will both run in the 4×100-meter, 4×200-meter and 4×400-meter relays during the afternoon session.
The Longhorn Network will broadcast live television coverage of the final day of this year’s Texas Relays beginning at 1:30 p.m. CT. The Longhorn Network’s coverage will also be streamed online on ESPN3.com.