Women's Track & Field | January 06, 2019
KALAMAZOO, Mich. – The Western Michigan track and field team opened the 2018-19 indoor season in impressive fashion with an 85-49 win in the team's annual Ice Breaker Dual Meet on Saturday afternoon.
The Broncos won 10 of the 13 events, including a near sweep of the field events.
"It was a very good start to the season for us," said head coach Kelly Lycan. We had a lot of very competitive performances on the day in all areas.
The throwers got Western Michigan rolling early. Sophomore Audrey Pickering took second overall after throwing over the 50' mark for the first time in her career. The California, Mo., native threw a new personal-best of 50' 4.75" (15.63m) to earn three points. Freshman Madison Ochs also took fourth place. Sophomore Abena Atuobi picked up WMU's first win of the meet, taking first in the shot put with a distance of 46' 5.25" (14.15m). WMU took the top three spots in the event, with Pickering taking second and Ochs in third.
"The throwers really got us off to a good start with a nice chunk of points," Lycan added. "It was nice to see our sophomore throwers already improving over their freshmen year."
Sophomore Diamond Mitchell won both the long jump and the triple jump. In the long jump she reached 18' 10.50" (5.75m), edging out teammate Erica Sheahan for the win. In the triple jump she topped teammate Lexie Moriarity by a half an inch after jumping 35' 3" (10.74m).
Junior Erica DePierre, Oakland's Whitney Mergens and WMU's Allison Hufnagel each reached a height of 5' 3" (1.60m) in the high jump. DePierre had the fewest misses and took the title. Hufnagel finished in third place.
Bronco freshman Taylor Rucker picked up her first collegiate win after dominating in the 60-meter hurdles. Rucker ran a time of 8.80 seconds, a full .30 faster than Oakland's Emily Schaub in second place. Junior Madison Meredith and Mitchell finished first and second in the 60-meter dash. Meredith ran a time of 7.70 seconds and Mitchell followed her at 7.79.
Junior Juliane Sormaine won the 800-meter run with a time of 2:21.57 and also took second in the mile run with a time of 5:11.00. Freshman Chloe McEachern took second in the 800 with a time of 2:23.32. Junior Erin Dowd claimed the 400-meter dash title with a time of 56.46 seconds and was followed in second place by freshman Taneidra Cain.
Sarah Anderson had a dominant performance in the 3,000-meter run, winning with a time of 10:07.78. Anderson cleared her closes competitor, Rachel Levy of Oakland, by nearly five seconds at 10:12.57.
The Golden Grizzlies did not field a 4x400-meter hurdle team. WMU's top team ran a time of 4:07.39.
WMU now heads to the University of Illinois for the Illini Classic on Saturday.
