BATON ROUGE – The LSU Track & Field teams anticipate the start of the outdoor season each year, and 2017 is no exception as both teams find themselves ranked among the Top 5 nationally with the Lady Tigers at No. 4 and the Tigers at No. 5 in the preseason rankings by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.
The Tigers open their 2017 outdoor season where they left off a year ago when they finished fifth nationally in the final men’s team standings at the NCAA Division I Outdoor Track & Field Championships.
The Lady Tigers are up two spots to open the season after wrapping up the 2016 season with a sixth-place team finish at the national meet held at Oregon’s Hayward Field. LSU’s men scored 41 points to crack the Top 5 for the third-straight season and the fifth time in six years. The women returned to the Top 10 at the NCAA Championships with their ninth top-six finish in the last 10 seasons.
LSU enters the 2017 outdoor season with three defending NCAA Champion relay teams after the Tigers and Lady Tigers swept NCAA titles in the 4×100-meter relay for the fifth time in their history while the men won a third relay crown at last year’s meet with their victory in the 4×400-meter relay.
LSU remains the only school in collegiate track and field to ever sweep both men’s and women’s 4×100-meter relay titles at the NCAA Championships while doing so in 1992, 1993, 1994, 2003 and 2016.
Both teams actually set Hayward Field records in their sweep of sprint relay titles in the national finals a year ago as Jaron Flournoy, Renard Howell, Tremayne Acy and Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake won the men’s crown in 38.33 seconds and Mikiah Brisco, Kortnei Johnson, Jada Martin and Rushell Harvey added the women’s title with a seasonal best of 42.65. They are strong favorites to repeat once again as Flournoy, Acy and Mitchell-Blake all return for the Tigers and all four legs on the Lady Tigers’ title-winning team return this season.
Two Tigers are also back from their NCAA Outdoor Champion 4×400-meter relay team a year ago as Michael Cherry, the reigning NCAA Outdoor Bronze Medalist in the 400 meters, and LaMar Bruton line up in 2017.
A host of other returning All-Americans look to pile up the points for their team in the championship season as seniors Nataliyah Friar, Travia Jones, Morgan Schuetz and Rebekah Wales rejoining the likes of junior Aleia Hobbs and sophomore Rachel Misher in giving the Lady Tigers one of the deepest squads in the country again this spring.
USTFCCCA Preseason Top 25
MEN
Team (Points) 2016 Finish
1. Florida (282.97) 1
2. Oregon (277.54) 4
3. Arkansas (253.11) 2
4. Texas A&M (232.69) 3
5. LSU (218.03) 5
6. Virginia (183.26) 7
7. Texas (169.14) 36
8. Alabama (167.36) 64
9. Georgia (156.00) 29
10. Stanford (153.94) 13
11. Southern California (138.93) 12
12. Texas Tech (138.19) 33
13. Ole Miss (129.75) 26
14. Tennessee (129.50) 6
15. Nebraska (125.27) 10
16. Syracuse (117.83) 47
17. Kansas (113.11) DNS
18. UCLA (106.86) 18
19. Minnesota (102.12) 47
20. Houston (96.18) 10
21. Virginia Tech (92.90) 8
22. Kentucky (92.37) 22
23. Western Kentucky (91.68) 57
24. Auburn (91.68) 58
25. South Carolina (89.84) 47
WOMEN
Team (Points) 2016 Finish
1. Oregon (345.06) 2
2. Kentucky (333.88) 11
3. Arkansas (293.38) 1
4. LSU (266.32) 6
5. Southern California (248.20) 9
6. Florida (241.82) 9
7. Georgia (197.42) 3
8. Texas (178.59) 4
9. Stanford (175.25) 7
10. Florida State (174.59) 29
11. Tennessee (147.81) 29
12. Texas A&M (141.26) 5
13. Washington (136.32) 63
14. Harvard (134.06) 17
15. Alabama (112.70) 29
16. Miami, Fla. (11.64) 16
17. Baylor (111.44) DNS
18. Nebraska (107.37) 46
19. Oklahoma (107.03) 18
20. Virginia Tech (100.37) DNS
21. Michigan (97.66) 20
22. South Carolina (97.66) 25
23. Ole Miss (83.70) 22
24. Auburn (81.28) 63
25. San Diego State (79.52) 20