LSU’s John Moffitt will look to defend his 2003 long jump conference title this weekend as the men’s and women’s track teams travel to Lexington, Ky. for the Southeastern Conference Indoor Track and Field Championships.
Moffitt earned the SEC crown last season with a long jump of 26 feet, 6.75 inches.
LSU will enter Lexington ranked No. 2 in the Trackwire Poll with 48 points, trailing No. 1 Arkansas with 76 points.
Auburn rounds out the Top 3 with 39 points.
With just three meets left until the NCAA Indoor Championships, coach Pat Henry said the SEC Championships are important.
“This is one of the more important meets of the year,” Henry said. “Not the most important, but one of the more important meets of the year.”
Aside from Moffitt’s NCAA-leading long jump distance of 27-1.75, LSU will be lead by LeJuan Simon.
Simon currently leads the SEC in the triple jump with a distance of 55-5.75. He also ranks third in the long jump at 25-7.25.
With eight Top 25 teams competing in Lexington, Henry said that the competition can benefit the team in the long run.
“This is a test to see where you are,” Henry said. “Everything we’ve done to this point is to try to prepare to do well on these next couple of days.”
In the 400-meter dash, LSU’s Kelly Willie and Peter Coley lead the conference with Kerron Clement and Reggie Weatherspoon of Florida following in the three and four spots.
LSU also leads the conference in the 4×400 relay, followed by Florida, Auburn and South Carolina.
The LSU women’s track team will head into the meet ranked No. 1 in the nation with a total of seven SEC teams ranked in the Top 25.
The Lady Tigers are led by senior Lolo Jones, who earned SEC Track Athlete of the Week honors for her performance in last week’s LSU Twilight Meet. She automatically qualified for the NCAA Championships with a time of 8.10 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles.
Jones’ mark leads the SEC this season, as well as tying for the second-best time in the nation.
“That’s the second-fastest time ever run in this building, and this building has been here a long time,” Henry said. “It’s an automatic [NCAA] qualifier and that’s good.”
Returning SEC champion Muna Lee will look for her fourth straight conference title in the 200-meter dash. With a 10-race winning streak on the line, Lee said she is looking forward to the meet.
“We’ll be alright,” said Lee. “It’s just like nationals because all our main competition will be there.”
Lee currently holds the second-best time in the SEC and NCAA this season with a time of 23.06.
Henry added that the preparation for this weekend can be just as important as winning the meet.
“Winning a meet or winning a championship is not necessarily the goal,” Henry said. “The goal for the coaches is that that everybody we have has prepared themselves to get on the track and compete at a level that we think they can compete on.”