May 28, 2009
NORMAL, Ill. -
Five Illinois State women's track and field athletes are set to compete at the 2009 NCAA Mideast Regional Track and Field Championships held in Louisville, Ky., and hosted by the University of Louisville at the Cardinal Park Track and Field Complex, May 29-30.
Set to compete in the field events for the Redbird's are senior Samantha Springer and freshmen Tori Ziegler and Leigh Petranoff, while sophomores Kirsten Lang and Michelle Brunk will compete on the track.
"It is important that they are confident as they leave here and head down to Louisville," said head coach Elvis Forde. "We are in one of the more difficult regions of the country when it comes down to the quality of athletes that will be competing."
Springer will lead the throwers into action as she will be competing in the hammer and discus Friday. The Tremont, Ill., native hit qualifying marks in all three of her events; discus, hammer and shot put and will compete in all three over the weekend. Her top performances in the discus and shot put coming at the State Farm Missouri Valley Conference Championships, where she took third in the shot put and won the discus title.
Heading into competition, Springer is seeded eighth in the Mideast Region in the discus and 17th in the nation. Her best toss of 172-04 in the disc places her with the second-best all-time distance at Illinois State. Springer's career-best throw of 47-11.25 in the shot put this season places her 40th entering the meet and she is also No. 29 in the Mideast Region in the hammer throw with a distance of 179-3.
Ziegler will join Springer in the shot put and holds a personal-best throw of 49-0.25, which ranks her No. 28 in the region and No. 2 all-time at ISU. The freshman from Fox Lake, Ill., hit the regional qualifying standard on four different occasions with her best throw coming at the Stan Lyons Invitational (April 25).
Finally, Petranoff has made her presence know in the Missouri Valley Conference and at Illinois State in the javelin throw. The native of Cranston, R.I., doesn't know how to lose when it comes to championships meets as she entered ISU with four Rhode Island state titles in the javelin and then captured the Valley Championship title this season with a career-best throw of 150-11. The distance broke the ISU record by four inches and gave her the eighth-best throw in the Mideast Region and 46th-best nationally.
"We don't want this to be an experience for the freshmen going to the meet, we want them to be true competitors and that the quality of competition raises their competition level," said Forde. "I hope that Tori and Leigh raise their levels of performance. Sam is to the level where she is a veteran and should be able to control her nerves and perform to the level she is capable of. I would like to see someone at the National championships."
On the track, Lang will represent the Redbirds in the 3,000-meter steeplechase. Lang, a sophomore, earned her regional mark at the Valley championships, where she finished fifth with a time of 10:45.13. The St. Charles, Ill., native enters the regional meet with the 18th fastest time.
Brunk a Palatine, Ill., native automatically advanced to the regional meet after winning her first MVC title in the 800-meter run with a time of 2:10.31. The sophomore owns a personal-best time of 2:10.22 that she achieved at the Billy Hayes Invitational. Ranked No. 34 in the region, Brunk will have to run a personal-best in the 800 preliminaries Friday in order to advance to the finals Saturday.
"In the middle distance we have Michelle and Kirsten," said Forde. "Michelle is a very feisty competitor and sometimes you can drop seconds that you never knew you had and she is capable of doing just that. Being at the championships gives you an opportunity to take that jump to the next level and we are optimistic that it can happen.
"Most of all I am excited for the women we are sending and hopefully they can do well and represent our program well and I just want to wish them good luck when they compete."
The top-five finishes in each region receive automatic bids to the NCAA Track and Field National Championships held in
Fayetteville, Ark., June 10-13. Anyone that finishes 6-12 in each region will be placed in an at large pool and will be accepted based on their season-best performances by the NCAA championships committee.
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