Rebels sweep conference indoor meet
Published 12:00 am Tuesday, March 30, 2004
MANKATO &045; The USC/Alden-Conger track and field teams opened the season on a successful note at the Gopher Conference Indoor Meet at Minnesota State-Mankato Friday night.
The girls squeaked out a two-point win over NRHEG, USC/AC with 115 and the Panthers with 113. WEM was third with 106 in the seven-team meet.
The Rebels were paced by five first-place performances, including the sprint medley relay team of Mandi Kruger, Sara Neubauer, Holly Theede and Jamie Klein.
“Mandi got us off to a good lead, and the other girls built on that lead,&uot; said coach Kent Viesselman.
Individually, Amy Christenson finished first in both the hurdle events, Kallie Rollenhagen won the triple jump, and Klein took first in the 3200-meter run to go along with her strong anchor leg in the medley.
Seconds for the Rebels included freshman Alesha Satre finished second in the 55-meter dash, Christenson in the high jump, and Katie Schultz ran a personal record to finish in the runner-up spot in the 800.
The 4×200 relay team of Alesha Satre, Neubauer, Ashlie Satre, and Rebecca Leland overcame “traffic problems” to finish second, as did the
4×400 team of Megan Jensen, Angela Hernandez, Theede and Rollenhagen.
“We were a little short-handed on the girls’ side, for a number of reasons,” said Viesselman. “In view of that, I’m pleased with the performance. We are very pleased with the competitiveness shown by our girls.”
The boys finished first with 130.5 points, followed by WEM with 115.5 and NRHEG 89 among seven schools.
The sprint medley team of Alex Bute, Simon Christensen, Spencer Niebuhr and Erik Melby won, as did the 4×400 team of Bob Schmitz, Matt Mueller, Alex Ramaker and Melby.
Top individual finishers were Brad Tomschin and Jon Voigt , who finished second in the 800 and 200, respectively. Voigt tied for second in the 55 Dash.
The 4×800 team of Bute, Amos Bessler, Shane Bias and Ramaker also took second place, as did the 4×200 team of Voigt, Jake Stenzel, Brad Tomschin and Schmitz.
“I think there were three very positive signs,&uot; said Viesselman.
&uot;One was the
improvement some of our less-experienced returnees from last year’s team. Another was the competitiveness shown by our freshmen. The third was that although we had only two first-place finishes, we did place in every event. We picked up a couple of ankle sprains the last few days, and that hurt our production.”