With one last chance to compete at Bernie Moore Track Stadium, LSU track and field senior thrower Tori Bliss made the most of the opportunity.
The LSU men’s and women’s track and field teams swept the competition Saturday at the LSU Invitational, with the No. 2 Tigers and No. 8 Lady Tigers each earning victories in the regular season finale.
Bliss headlined the Lady Tigers’ 146 points with a school and stadium-record throw in the shot put. Bliss eclipsed her own school record of 57 feet, 5 ½ inches she set April 11 at the Jim Click Shootout with an NCAA-leading 60-8 on her fifth attempt of the meet.
The reigning NCAA Indoor silver medalist is now the favorite to win the NCAA title going into the postseason, as she jumped Southern Illinois’ Raven Saunders and Missouri’s Jill Rushin for the No. 1 ranking in the country.
“To be at that mark right now is great,” Bliss said in a news release. “We’ve still got a lot of season left … We’ll get some weeks off in between meets now, so to be out over that mark at this point with so much time left, I feel like I’m in a good spot right now.”
Sophomore distance runner Morgan Schuetz took the track for the Lady Tigers, where she crossed the line with the No. 3 time nationally in the 800-meter race. Her winning time of 2 minutes, 3.12 seconds is nearly four seconds faster than her previous outdoor-best. LSU coach Dennis Shaver said it was a great way for Schuetz to cap off the regular season.
Freshman sprinter Aleia Hobbs and junior sprinter and hurdler Chanice Chase followed Schuetz onto the track with event titles in the 100-meter dash and 400-meter hurdles, respectively.
While Bliss catapulted herself into the No. 1 spot in the shot put, senior thrower Rodney Brown put his No. 1 ranking in the discus on the line against Alabama’s reigning NCAA Champion Hayden Reed.
Brown unleashed a winning throw of 207-6, finishing the regular season a perfect 7-for-7 in the discus and leading the Tigers to victory with 158 team points.
“For [Brown] to win that again here and keep his undefeated season going is pretty exciting for him,” Shaver said in a news release. “Rodney has thrown over 200 [feet] this year in every meet, and that’s not an easy thing to accomplish. It’s that kind of consistency we need from him as we go into the championship season.”
The Tigers already boasted three of the top 10 runners in the 400-meter dash entering the meet and added another Saturday.
Senior sprinter and hurdler Quincy Downing took the tape with a personal-best time of 45.70, the seventh-best time in the country, while junior sprinter Fitzroy Dunkley eclipsed his personal-best by four-tenths of a second. Dunkley emerged with the No. 10 time nationally in his first season running the 400-meter dash full time.
The Tigers closed out the regular season with “tremendous” performances in the distance races, Shaver said. Middle distance runners sophomore Blair Henderson and senior Julian Parker each raced out to personal-best times in the 800-meter dash, posting nationally ranked times. Henderson’s time of 1:47.03 is the seventh-best time, and Parker accounts for the No. 10 time at 1:47.33.
Meanwhile, senior Philip Primeaux clocked in at 14:47.34 for a first-place finish in the 5,000-meter race.
“That was just a tremendous effort, some pretty good racing from those guys today,” Shaver said. “Both Julian Parker and Blair Henderson got in the right kind of race. This is the second time that they’ve been in races where they really needed to step their game up to be competitive, and I felt like they have done it both times.”
You can reach Jacob Hamilton on Twitter @jhamilton_TDR.
