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Lady Tigers Regain No. 1 Dual Meet Ranking

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Lady Tigers Regain No. 1 Dual Meet Ranking

BATON ROUGE – Following a dual-meet sweep of the UCLA Bruins and TCU Horned Frogs at the Rafer Johnson/Jackie Joyner-Kersee Invitational on Saturday, the LSU Lady Tigers have reclaimed their No. 1 national ranking in the latest Track & Field News Women’s Collegiate Dual Meet Top 25 released late Tuesday afternoon.

The Lady Tigers scored an impressive 92-70 victory over UCLA and a decisive 111-42 victory over TCU to improve to a perfect 4-0 in dual meets during the 2013 campaign.

Each of LSU’s four dual-meet victories this season have come against nationally-ranked squads as the program has faced one of the strongest dual-meet schedules in the country this year. That includes a sweep of No. 2-ranked Texas A&M and No. 7-ranked Arkansas at the Texas A&M Triangular during the indoor season on Jan. 19 and a sweep of No. 11-ranked UCLA and No. 25-ranked TCU on Saturday afternoon.

Highlighting the event at UCLA’s Drake Stadium this past weekend was a record-setting performance by Lady Tiger junior Natoya Goule, who set a collegiate dual meet record in the women’s 800 meters while lining up in her first two-lap race of the outdoor season. Goule’s season-opening run of 2 minutes, 1.18 seconds broke the previous collegiate dual meet record of 2:01.65 set in 2004 by Wisconsin’s Amy Wickus.

Goule’s 2:01.18 also set a new LSU outdoor school record as she became the new SEC, NCAA and World leader in the 800 meters outdoors in 2013 while being named the SEC Women’s Runner of the Week.

The Lady Tigers will have an opportunity to solidify their No. 1 ranking in the race for the Track & Field News Women’s Collegiate Dual Meet National Championship when they play host to the third-annual Battle on the Bayou dual meet on Saturday as they welcome No. 8-ranked Arizona State, No. 14-ranked Penn State and unranked Mississippi State to the Bernie Moore Track Stadium.

Track & Field News Women’s Collegiate Dual Meet Top 25 (as of April 9)

Team (Record) Last Rank
1. LSU (4-0) 2
2. Texas A&M (4-1) 3
3. Oregon (2-1) 1
4. Michigan (3-0) 9
5. Stanford (0-0) 4
6. Kansas (2-0) 5
7. Arkansas (0-2) 6
8. Arizona State (0-0) 7
9. Arizona (0-0) 8
10. Notre Dame (3-0) 14
11. UCLA (1-1) 12
12. California (1-1) 11
13. Nebraska (2-0) 10
14. Penn State (0-0) NR
15. Kansas State (3-0) 22
16. Michigan State (2-2) 15
17. South Florida (3-2) 18
18. Kent State (1-0) 20
19. Indiana State (4-0) 19
20. Washington (1-2) NR
21. Southern California (0-0) 17
22. Washington State (2-3) 13
23. Alabama (1-1) 21
24. Dartmouth (7-0) NR
25. TCU (0-2) 16