By: Chris Little-NSU Sports Information
BATON ROUGE – The Northwestern State track and field teams conclude the indoor regular season Friday with a return trip to the Carl Maddox Fieldhouse for the second time in 15 days, lining up in the LSU Twilight Meet.
The competition is the last one for NSU before the Southland Conference Indoor Championships in Birmingham on Feb. 24-25.
Hinds Community College, McNeese, Meridian Community College, Mississippi College, Mobile, New Orleans, Nicholls, Southeastern Louisiana, Tulane, William Carey, Xavier (NO), and the hosting Tigers are all scheduled to attend Friday's meet.
Field events begin with the men's weight throw trials and finals at noon while track events kick off at 2:15 p.m. with the women's 60 meter dash qualifying round.
Both NSU teams have had successful seasons, but head coach
Mike Heimerman says they will not take this final meet before conference lightly.
"Just about everybody will compete in an event," said Heimerman. "We don't want to take the week completely off especially since it's supposed to rain all next week. You've always got to be ready, and they should all be fresh for conference in two weeks."
The Demons and Lady Demons most recently competed in the most prestigious meet of the indoor season at the UA Tyson Invitational hosted by the University of Arkansas. The 33-school showcase with some of the nation's elite brought out the best of the 17 NSU athletes who set personal records in the two-day extravaganza.
Jasmyn Steels took long jump gold in Fayetteville, Arkansas this past weekend with a jump of 20-9 ¼ moving up to seventh nationally, first in the Southland Conference, and second in the school record book, only 1 ¼ inches behind by four-time All-American Stephanie Sowell in 2004. The junior was voted SLC female field athlete of the week for a second-straight week for her performance. She has yet to be defeated in the event this season.
Ceaser Stephens also cracks the nation's top-25 in the triple jump. His winning jump of 51-8 ¼ at Arkansas moved him to the top spot in the conference and 25
th in the country and is a new personal record for indoors. The senior leads the nation's fifth-ranked triple jump event squad. The squad rankings are calculated by averaging a school's top performances by four different competitors in a given event.
Tremayne Flagler comes into the weekend with the conference's second best 60 hurdle time and personal best of 7.86, a mark he achieved at the UA Tyson Invitational.
Deja Moore and
Natashia Jackson currently sit near the top of the SLC in two events each. Jackson ranks second in both the 200 dash (24.32) and the 400 (54.88) while Moore ranks second in the 60 (7.52) and third in the 200 (24.41).
All-American sprinter
Micah Larkins continues to hold the SLC's third place time in the 60 with a time of 6.69 that he ran on Jan. 26 at the Pittsburg State Invitational.
The marks by Steels, Stephens, and Flagler at the Tyson Invitational were tops among the 17 PRs by NSU competitors. Other PRs by the Lady Demons:
- Lauren Clarke, 41-2 ½ in the triple jump
- Reagan Darbonne, 13-2 ½ in the pole vault (indoor)
- Kimani Evans, 7.58 in the 60
- Jayla Fields, 7.88 in the 60
- Ona Giles, 7.74 in the 60
- Diana Granados, 56.59 in the 400 (indoor)
- Jasmine Hall, 25.16 in the 200 (indoor)
- Isabella Hudson, 5:14.09 in the mile
- Kori Levingston, 58.48 in the 400
- Courtney Willis, 57.36 in the 400 (indoor)
Other PRs posted by Demons at Arkansas:
For live results of the LSU Twilight meet Friday, follow this link:
Live results
NSU updates will also be provided on Twitter on the @NSUDemonsTF account.
