Story by Gage Johnson
Sports Editor
Three first-place finishes helped the Murray State track and field team walk away with second overall at the OVC Indoor Championships.
The Racers began competing on Thursday, Feb. 20, and ended the day in position to compete for the OVC title on day two. Twelve top-ten finishes put Murray State in fourth place, trailing the first place Tennessee Tech by 21.5 points.
Head Coach Adam Kiesler felt the team competed well on day one and expected the team to come together for a strong day two.
“Today was all-around a good day one for us,” said head coach Adam Kiesler. “We had numerous kids step up to help the team and set season bests or personal bests at the most important time. There were a few things that we wish would have broken our way, but this team has done a great job of picking each other up and we expect that again tomorrow.”
With some ground to make up, senior Tamdra Lawrence started things off for the Racers by setting the new school record and OVC Championship meet record time in the 60m. With a time of 7.41 seconds, Lawrence grabbed her and Murray State’s first gold of the day. Lawrence continued to rack up the accolades with a season-best time of 24.12 seconds in the 200m.
Junior Hillary McAdam snagged the third gold of the day for the Racers, finishing in the 800m with a time of 2:19.39.
Murray State received a big scoring boost in the pentathlon as senior Aubrey Main, sophomore Jessihka Ribeiro and OVC Freshman of the Year Ashlyn Oren all placed in the top five.
Eight more top-ten finishes found the Racers within grasp of the OVC title. McAdam, Abdur-Rafia, Lawrence, and Main looked to finish ahead of Tennessee Tech to claim the conference championship, but were unable to do and finished the day with second place.
Kiesler was thrilled with the team’s finish and expects this momentum to carry into the outdoor portion of the season.
“I can’t be more proud of this group,” said head coach Adam Kiesler. “We had ups and downs, but every time there was an outcome we didn’t want, a teammate stepped up and did better than we expected. We came out to win we fell short of that goal, but I learned a lot about this team and I am very happy to be able to coach them. I am also very proud of Coach Riggins, Wallace, and Neu. They had their event groups ready to go and they did very well. We will keep the same goal for outdoor and make sure to keep this in mind the next couple of months while we train.”
