Jan. 12, 2012
After a promising early December meet at Clemson, the women’s track and field team resume their season this weekend at the Kentucky Invitational.
Sophomores Brionne Williams and Ellie Tidman jumped right back into form at Clemson, something that head coach Steve Keith hopes they can build on as the program looks to score down the road in the SEC championships.
“We only scored in two events last year in the conference,” noted Keith, “so we want to improve on that. The more events we can score on the better as far as establishing a foundation to build off of. But Ellie and Brionne, they had a good start at Clemson. Those were excellent openers for the both of them. Especially Ellie.”
Tidman sat the spring outdoor season last year after suffering a knee injury that required surgery. Clemson was her first competition in ten months.
Her performance, along with vaulters Meagan Martin and Morgan Toone, and Williams’ high jump, in which she equaled her outdoor personal best from previous years, all have Keith excited for the new season.
“Meagan was right on the edge of scoring outdoors, so we’d like to get her over that hump, so to speak,” said Keith.
Freshman Janetra Gleaves will see plenty of action early on as well, as the coaches look to find the right combination of indoor events.
“We’re going to have Janetra do three or four different events,” said Keith. “We’re trying to forecast what kind of indoor combined events she can do, see if she can score at the conference at that level and to that end we’re going to have to put her in three or four events in pretty much every meet we go to.”
For the distance runners, junior Kristen Findley, a key component in the cross country season, will open in the mile, while Allie Scalf will take on the 3K. The energetic crew, much like their fall cross country teammates who join them in the track and field season, are a tight-knit group.
The Commodores enter this part of their season unranked, and will be without their seven runners who competed in the cross country NCAA Championships for this first trip to Kentucky.