Track and Field Hits the Road for Ohio State Invitational

Friday, January 30

Columbus, Ohio

4 p.m.

Purdue Fort Wayne

Ohio State Invitational

Track and Field Hits the Road for Ohio State Invitational

1/29/2015 4:00:00 PM | Women's Track and Field

FORT WAYNE, Ind. – The IPFW women's track and field team will spend its final month of the indoor season on the road, beginning at the Ohio State Invitational in Columbus, Ohio on Friday, January 30^th at 4 p.m.

Meet: Ohio State Invitational
When: Friday, January 30 | 4 p.m.
Where: Columbus, Ohio | French Field House

LAST TIME OUT
IPFW wrapped up its indoor home slate on Friday, January 23 as the team hosted the third annual IPFW Duals at the Gates Field House. The 'Dons came out on top in four out of five of their head-to-head matchups, beating Butler, IUPUI, Oakland and Valparaiso, while falling short versus Detroit. Overall it was a solid day for a young squad.

Freshman Kiawna Cottrell stole the show for the Mastodons as she broke a program record in the 200-meter dash and tied another in the 60-meter dash en route to earning a pair of first-place finishes. Cottrell's time in the 200 of 26.01 bested the old mark of 26.37 set by Kaylin Taylor in 2013, while her 7.90 in the 60 tied Jazmin Perry's 2011 time. In just three collegiate meets, the first-year athlete has shattered two school records, tied one and came within one second of breaking two others—an impressive start to a promising career.

A pair of sophomores in Tori Nida and Rachel Kacer turned in the best times of the year for the team in their respective events. Nida posted a 1:03.07 in the 400-meter dash and Kacer recorded a 10:48.69 in the 3,000 meter run—almost a full second faster than her previous career high of 11:47.62.

The host team's 4x400-meter group of Nida, Kyley Marano, Jenna Quillen and Alexis Wygant finished with the second-best indoor time of the season with a 4:11.32 in the final race of the day.

In the field events, freshman Ashley Brown led the way for the Blue and White as she tied for first in the women's high jump event (1.60m). Marano and Quillen finished third (1.55m) and fifth, respectively (1.45m).

WHO TO WATCH FOR
Despite being a young squad with 24 underclassmen on a 27-person roster, a strong group of sophomores will lead the way this season.

Nida, Marano and fellow sophomore Brittany Beard are all key returnees for the Blue and White as the trio were a part of last year's 4x400m relay that just missed on setting the program record a season ago. Nida also recorded team season-bests a year ago in the 400-meter dash with a time of 1:01.06, while Marano turned in team-bests in the 200-meter dash (26.95) and high jump (5-4.25/1.63m).

Wygant was a stud in her first year for IPFW with indoor season-bests in the long jump (14-7/1.63m), triple jump (31-3/9.52m) and pentathlon (2274).

Junior Andrea Bell, a veteran on this year's team, will be in the forefront for distance running as she recorded a team-best time of 18:24.24 in the 5,000-meter event during the 2013-14 indoor season.

~ Feel the Rumble ~