Three punch Big Sky tickets at MSU
2/13/2010 12:00:00 AM | Women's Track and Field
Junior Richard Brumbaugh, sophomore Melissa Jenkins and freshman Gwen Abbott all had Big Sky Conference-qualifying performances for the Montana indoor track and field teams Friday evening at Montana State???s Fleet Feet Invitational.
The Grizzlies were competing with a partial team at MSU. Montana has 16 of its top athletes competing Saturday at the Washington Husky Classic in Seattle.
Brumbaugh, one of the top javelin throwers in the Big Sky Conference and an NCAA Midwest Regional qualifier in that event last spring, earned his first career Big Sky indoor qualification Friday with a fifth-place distance of 50-7.25 in the shot put.
Jenkins qualified for the 400 meters for the second straight indoor season, finishing fifth in a career-best time of 57.79 to meet the event standard of 58.00.
Abbott, who???s been near the Big Sky standard of 5-4 all winter, finally hit the mark with a fourth-place jump of 5-4.25.
With the Big Sky Conference indoor championships, which will be held at Montana State Friday and Saturday, Feb. 26-27, two weekends away, Montana has 18 women with 30 qualifications in 12 different events and 12 men with 14 qualifications in eight events.
A pair of athletes had improved performances on previous qualifications Friday and two came as close as possible to qualifying but came up just short.
Senior Kelsey Smith went an indoor career-best 12-0 to finish third in the pole vault. She broke her previous indoor best of 11-6.5 by nearly half a foot and moved into the top seven in the Big Sky Conference.
Sophomore Caleb McSurdy improved upon his previous Big Sky qualifier of 52-4.75 by winning the shot put with a mark of 53-4.5. McSurdy???s event victory was the Grizzlies??? only one of the meet.
Junior Jennifer Walter and sophomore Joey Frank both came up just short in their attempt to qualify.
Walter finished fourth in the 55 meters with a season-best time of 7.37. Her raw time would have met the Big Sky standard of 7.38, but with Bozeman???s negative altitude-adjustment of 0.02 for the sprints, Walter came up one-hundredth of a second short.
Frank went a career-best 50-5.5 in the shot put to finish seventh. It was a career best by nearly a foot but came up a half inch short of the Big Sky standard of 50-6.
In addition to McSurdy???s victory, three other Montana athletes had top-three performances.
Sophomore Jessica Leslie was second in the long jump at 17-8.75, freshman Bryan DeFelice was second in the triple jump at 43-9.75 and freshman Austin Emry was third in the triple jump at 43-6.5.
Montana???s non-qualifiers will have a final opportunity to compete in Montana State???s last-chance meet next Friday prior to the Big Sky indoor championships.
