March 26, 2014
COLUMBIA, Mo. - As the 2014 Outdoor Track & Field season continues picking up momentum, the Tigers travel down to Texas for a double-header weekend at the University of Texas and Texas State. Both meets will start Thursday afternoon and continue through Saturday.
The women enter the weekend at No. 27 in the NCAA pre-season rankings, as released by the USTFCCCA (U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association) on Tuesday. This is the highest ranking for either team since 2008 when the pre-season rankings began, and the first time they have cracked into the top 30 entering the season.
TEXAS RELAYS
Meet Home | Schedule | Live Results
First on the slate is the 87th annual Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays at the University of Texas' Mike A. Myers Stadium. The site for last year's Round One of the NCAA Championships, the Tigers will now look to kick off their exciting season in Austin with one of the country's most prestigious meets. Included among the 232 collegiate teams taking to the track for the four-day meet are eight fellow-SEC programs and 18 other top-25 ranked teams, as released by the USTFCCCA (U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association).
SEC Competition: Arkansas, Auburn, Florida, Kentucky, LSU, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Texas A&M
Women's Pre-Season Top 25: Texas A&M (No. 1), Texas (No. 3), Florida (No. 4), Kentucky (No. 5), LSU (No. 8), Kansas (No. 10), Florida State (No. 12), UCLA (No. 13), Arkansas (No. 14), Texas Tech (No. 16), Penn State (No. 17), Notre Dame (No. 18), Baylor (No. 25)
Men's Pre-Season Top 25: Arkansas (No. 1), Florida (No. 2), Texas A&M (No. 3), Florida State (No. 5), LSU (No. 8), UCLA (No. 9), Nebraska (No. 11), Ole Miss (No. 12), Texas Tech (No. 14), Baylor (No. 17), Texas (No. 18), Penn State (No. 19), BYU (No. 20), Cornell (No. 21), California (No. 24)
Among the group of Tigers who will join the elite competition are four Missouri School Record Holders, 13 All-Time Top Ten performers, and returning All-Americans Kearsten Peoples, Jill Rushin, and Katrine Haarklau.
Peoples and Rushin closed out the indoor season for the Tigers at the NCAA Championships in Albuquerque, NM, earlier in March with three All-American performances and a 16th-place team finish, the highest for the Tigers since 2001. Peoples earned back-to-back top eight finishes, nabbing her fifth and sixth career All-American finishes in the weight throw (seventh) and shot put (third). Rushin joined her on the podium for the shot put, placing sixth for her first career All-American award.
Peoples and Haarklau both made the podium at the 2013 Outdoor Track & Field Championships in Eugene, Ore., in the shot put and pole vault, respectively. The pair is also responsible for all four school record performers hitting the track this weekend, with Peoples topping the list for both the shot put (18.22m / 59-9.5) and discus (55.60m / 182-5), and Haarklau holding best marks in the pole vault (4.35m / 14-3.25) and the javelin (49.56m / 162-7).
Other All-Time Top Ten performers for the women include Peoples (hammer throw - No. 2), Rushin (shot put - No. 4) and senior Hailey Twietmeyer (javelin - No. 2).
The men add five more All-Time Top Ten performers to the list for the weekend, including sophomore Tony Carodine (triple jump - No. 9), senior Tre Chambers (100-meter dash - No. 9), junior Brian Duncan (hammer throw - No. 9), junior Macauley Garton (javelin - No. 4), and junior Jonathan Ilori (triple jump - No. 8).
THURSDAY SCHEDULE
12:30 p.m. Women's Hammer Throw (Katie Evans | Kearsten Peoples)
3:30 p.m. Men's Hammer Throw (Brian Duncan)
5:00 p.m. Men's 400-Meter Hurdles, Prelim (Drake Stuedemann)
FRIDAY SCHEDULE
9:30 a.m. Women's Javelin (Hailey Twietmeyer)
9:45 a.m. Men's 110-Meter Hurdes (Ser Whitaker)
Men's 100-Meter Dash (Tre Chambers)
Men's 4x400-Meter Relay
10:00 a.m. Women's High Jump (Morgan Whitson)
11:30 a.m. Men's Javelin (Macauley Garton)
12:30 p.m. Men's Triple Jump (Tony Carodine | Jonathan Ilori)
4:00 p.m. Women's Discus, Section A (Kearsten Peoples)
7:30 p.m. Women's Shot Put (Katie Evans | Kearsten Peoples | Jill Rushin)
8:15 p.m. Women's Pole Vault (Katrine Haarklau)
SATURDAY SCHEDULE
10:00 a.m. Women's Discus, Section B (Katie Evans | Jill Rushin)
BOBCAT INVITATIONAL
Schedule
Only 30 miles down the road from Austin is San Marcos and Texas State University, which will host the three-day Bobcat Invitational (March 27th - 29th). Five Tigers will join the seven who will double-back from the Texas Relays for the weekend's second meet. Included among those are three All-Time Top Ten performers for the women, including senior Heather Green (pole vault - No. 3), junior Maggie Givens (pole vault - No. 5), and junior Morgan Whitson (javelin - No. 9).
THURSDAY SCHEDULE
1:00 p.m. Women's Pole Vault (Alyssa Applebee | Maggie Givens | Heather Green)
4:00 p.m. Women's Discus (Katie Evans | Kearsten Peoples | Jill Rushin)
FRIDAY SCHEDULE
3:00 p.m. Women's Hammer Throw (Katie Evans | Jill Rushin)
Men's Hammer Throw (Brian Duncan)
Women's High Jump (Camille Hayes)
4:30 p.m. Men's High Jump (Tyler Donels)
SATURDAY SCHEDULE
9:00 a.m. Women's Javelin (Hailey Twietmeyer | Morgan Whitson)
2:00 p.m. Women's 100-Meter Hurdles (Morgan Whitson)
Men's 200-Meter Dash (Ser Whitaker)
For the latest on your Tigers, stay tuned to MUTigers.com and follow the team on Twitter @MIZ_TrackField.