Recently the men’s indoor track and field team competed at the 2014 Southland Conference Indoor Track & Field Championships in Birmingham, Al., and earned the first Southland Conference win for men’s indoor track and field in Southeastern’s history.
One week later Head Coach Sean Brady was subsequently named the 2014 Men’s Indoor Coach of the Year.
“I knew that we were good, and that we had an opportunity to win it,” said Brady. “For me it had just been a stressful couple of weeks leading into the event. I’m more relieved than anything. We got that monkey off our back and won our first indoor title. I felt great for our kids and for our staff.”
Brady said that the championship meet was the chance for many senior athletes to step up, and the male athletes all peaked in their performances at the same time, which was key in their conference win.
“Going into the meet we were ranked third and about 20 points down from the first place team on paper,” said Brady. “Historically ours has been a program that shows up big at conference, and they certainly did when it counted.”
Senior Jeffrey Milliron was named the Men’s Outstanding Field Performer. Milliron’s first place performances in both the shot put and weight throw events at the championships.
“It was huge,” said Brady. “We scored about 119 points in the meet, and [Milliron] scored 20 of those points. Not only was that 20 points, but anytime you can get a first place, that’s big, and he got two of them.”
Milliron was named to the 2014 Indoor Track and Field All-Conference Team for both weight throw and shot put.
The other standout Lion athletes named to Men’s All-Conference teams were Clarence Robinson for high jump, Brandon Daniels for 60-meter dash and long jump, T.J. Herbert for 200-meter dash, Kadarius Williams for high jump, Brett Olsen for weight throw and shot put and Abram Taylor for 60-meter hurdles.
Brady was also proud of the women’s track and field team ranking sixth in the Southland Conference standings this year out of 14 teams.
Named to the Women’s All-Conference teams were Ikea Kaufman for high jump, Misha Frazier for shot put, Brianna Golden for weight throw and Alicia Noel for 60-meter hurdles.
“I thought that [sixth] was a huge finish for the [women’s indoor],” said Brady. “Six out of 14 teams is pretty good considering that one of our best athletes took ill that weekend. She was projected to be about a 15 point score for us, and she only managed to score a few points. So we didn’t really get the full production of what we could have, but in almost every case we saw young freshmen and sophomore step up and contribute.”
Brady expects both the men’s and women’s track and field teams to compete well in outdoor, and he believes both teams will compete at a higher level because the athletes usually perform better outdoor.
The outdoor track and field season kicked off last week at the Jaguar Opener at the University of Alabama. The women’s team placed second behind Alabama, and the men’s team placed third.
This week the team will continue the outdoor track and field season at the McNeese Cowboy Relays in Lake Charles on March 15. For additional information, visit www.lionsports.net.