Michaela Rose swept both of her events at the three-day indoor track and field SEC championships, as the LSU women’s team finished third overall.
The senior was one of four on the winning distance medley relay team on day one of the competition and became the 800-meter race champion on day three for the third straight year.
The Tigers’ indoor track and field squad earned eight medals, including two silver and four bronze.
On Thursday, Feb. 27, LSU announced the death of freshman pole-vaulter Dillon Reidenauer in a car accident on Wednesday night. The team honored her with a black ribbon pinned to their uniforms and hand-written notes on the inside of their bibs.
The day ended with the Tigers’ A-team breaking records all around.
Callie Hardy, Ella Onojuvwevwo, Lorena Rangel Batres and Rose cleared victory in the distance-medley relay by over five seconds for a season-best and meet record of 10:50.15. The quad shaved off more than a second from their previous best.
The last time an LSU women’s DMR team won the SEC title was 40 years ago.
The last of the relay runners, Rangel Batres, went on to win silver in the women’s one-mile race two days later. She missed out on another gold medal by less than two-tenths of a second.
Day Two saw Rose place her bid for another gold medal as she qualified third in the 800-meter preliminary round behind Arkansas duo Sanu Jallow and Analisse Batista.
In the event’s final on Day Three, she further etched her name in history when she took the early lead and never let it go. Her time of 2:00.25 beat out Jallow by four-tenths of a second and marked a season-best.
After her monumental wins, Rose revealed her bib’s note in memoriam of her late teammate, which read, “Rest in love Dillon.”
Since her signing, Rose’s collegiate career has consisted of one NCAA and three Tiger all-time best indoor track performances. Her 800-meter time from the 2024 SEC indoor championships is the fastest in LSU history and second-fastest in the NCAA. This year’s two-minute time was only a second shy of her own record.
Other standouts from the weekend include multiple Tiger top-10 all-time performances in distance, sprints and jumps.
The sprint categories were full of close finishes as Brianna Lyston snatched a silver medal in the 60-meter dash for a season-best time of 7.13 but missed gold by a margin of one-hundredth of a second.
Season regular Jaiden Reid had a similar story and missed silver in the 200-meter dash by a hundredth, although setting a new personal best of 20.27 for the No. 5 time in the world.
Jahiem Stern set another personal best in the 60-meter hurdles, with a time of 7.57, to take bronze and the No. 3 spot on the LSU all-time performance list.
Additional bronze medalists include freshman Edna Chepkemoi in the 5000-meter race, who timed 15:39.43, and Machaeda Linton in the triple jump, who leaped 13.52 meters.
The Tigers will compete in the NCAA championships on March 14-15 in Virginia Beach, Va. The women’s team finished sixth overall in 2024 and will want to improve in 2025 for the best possible result before the outdoor season starts later in the month.
