MOREHEAD, Ky. – It has been an outstanding start to the indoor track and field season for Morehead State and it will attempt to build off its accomplishments on Friday at the PNC Bank Bellarmine Classic.
Coach
Clay Dixon is sending 36 athletes to compete in 15 events at the meet, which will be held at the Norton Healthcare Sports & Learning Center in Louisville. Competition will begin at 10 a.m. with the men's 60-meter hurdles, men's shot put, men's long jump, men's pole vault, and women's long jump.
It will be the third consecutive year the Eagles will participate in the event at Bellarmine. Last January, the women placed 12th, while the men were 14th. In 2022, the ladies finished 11th and the guys 13th.
Twenty-four teams are expected to compete, seven of which are in the Ohio Valley Conference. In addition to MSU and host Bellarmine, the field also will include Belmont, Cumberland (Tenn.) University, Eastern Kentucky, Evansville, IUPUI, Jacksonville State, Lipscomb, Louisville, Marshall, Miami (Ohio), Murray State, Northern Kentucky, Southeast Missouri, SIUE, Southern Illinois, Southern Indiana, Tennessee State, UT Martin, Vincennes (Ind.) University, Western Illinois, Western Kentucky and Xavier (Ohio).
There will be a lot of familiar squads suiting up for the meet, which should give the Eagles a good baseline of what to expect in the postseason as well as how far they have progressed since their opener in December.
"This meet should be pretty exciting," Dixon said. "(For) most of the team, it will be their first race since January 13th. So, I think we should see some pretty big improvements."
At last year's competition, junior
Lucy Singleton won the 800-meter run. She covered the course in 2:18.29, winning by 62-hundredths of a second, while falling just 2.33 seconds shy of the meet record of 2:15.96.
On Friday, Singleton will run the mile. She will be joined by junior
Cloe Copas; sophomores
Kaylyn Holman,
Casey Skaggs and
Abby Taylor; and freshmen
Taylor Allen,
Lani Baskett and
Emily Spradlin. That race is expected to begin at 3:15 p.m.
Taylor (19th in 5:29.79), Copas (33rd in 5:46.01) and Skaggs (49th in 6:25.88) all ran in last year's meet.
In her only other race at the distance this year, the Marshall Alumni Classic on January 13th, Singleton clocked a "pr" of 5:06.60, which according to Dixon was the second-fastest mark in school history. She currently owns the fifth-best mile time in the OVC this winter.
It has been a successful campaign thus far for Singleton. She also finished second in the 800-meter run in 2:18.08 at the Youngstown State University Collegiate Invitational presented by Southwoods Health two weeks ago. She did not run at MSU's only other indoor meet, the Marshall Opener.
Friday's first event of the day for the Eagles will be the women's long jump. Freshman
Ginger Hayden has a season-best mark of 5.08 meters (16'08.00"), which she set at the Marshall Opener in December.
The first track contest will be the men's 60-meter dash at 10:35 a.m. Freshmen
Derril Carr and
Cade Sullivan will represent the Blue and Gold.
The men's and women's 3,000-meter runs are MSU's next races. Fifth-year team member
Jarrett Forrest; seniors
Justin Bland,
Kyle Embry,
Peyton Fairchild and
Kyler Stewart; redshirt junior
Jacob Vogelpohl and freshman
Keghan Thompson are entered. It is expected to begin at 11:30 a.m.
Embry placed eighth in the event in each of the last two years, topping the Eagle men who are returning for this year's meet. Last winter he notched a time of 8:33.84. In 2022, he clocked a 8:47.84. Vogelpohl (18th in 8:48.57), Stewart (29th in 9:05.56) and Fairchild (45th in 9:21.10) also ran in 2023.
Junior
Megan Bush will toe the line at 12:20 p.m. for the women's competition.
The men's 800m will follow at 12:50 p.m. with senior
Toby Cook, juniors
Sam Lucas and
Austin Montgomery, and freshman
Asher Jack running for MSU. The women's version is scheduled to start at 1:15 p.m., with redshirt junior
Jennifer Ramirez, redshirt sophomore
Bella Almodovar, and true sophomores
Natalie Curry and
Hope Harris competing for the Eagles.
The women's triple jump will start at 1 p.m. Hayden will compete in the discipline for the first time this season, which also will mark the first time an Eagle has participated in the event in at least 14 years.
Redshirt junior
Micah Gray and freshman
Cheyenne Stark will hit the starting line for the 400-meter dash at 1:40 p.m. and 2:10 p.m., respectively. Gray placed 20th in 54.54 last January.
The men's mile will begin at 2:40 p.m. Senior
Alex Murray, and freshmen
Brady Baker,
Noah Bunting,
Garrett West and Aden Whitsell will represent the Eagles.
Carr and Sullivan will compete for the second time of the day in the 200-meter dash, which is scheduled for 3:55 p.m. Stark also returns for the race. Hers is slated to begin at 4:35 p.m.
Senior
Laikin Tarlton is entered in MSU's final contest of the day, the women's 3,000m invitational at 4:55 p.m. She is coming off an impressive performance in the 5,000-meter run at Youngstown State on Jan. 19, which earned her OVC co-Track Athlete of the Week honors. Just under three weeks ago, Tarlton finished second in the 3,000m at the Marshall Alumni Classic in a personal-best mark of 10:14.72. She has the sixth-fastest time in the OVC this year.
Friday's talented 13-runner 3,000m invitational collegiate field also will include Marshall's Abby Herring, EKU's Saskia Pingpank, Louisville's Haley Meade and seven competitors from Lipscomb. Tarlton finished 13th overall in 10:47.78 at last year's meet.
The results link is:
https://live.dcracetiming.com/meets/30040.
The Blue and Gold will make a return trip to Marshall next Friday and Saturday for the Marshall Invitational. It will be the team's final competition before the OVC Championships, which will take place on Wednesday and Thursday, Feb. 21-22 in Birmingham, Ala.
