The Big East Indoor Track & Field Championships were held on Sunday and Monday, and YOUR Marquette brought home hardware. Both the men’s team and the women’s team finished second in the team scoring. The men racked up 163 points, but were beat out for the team title by 186 points from Villanova. The Marquette women tallied 112 points in their competitions, but yet once again, it was Villanova edging them off the top of the podium with 134 points.
The Marquette men have finished second at the conference meet in six consecutive contests, while the women have finished as runner up for the second time in three seasons.
Marquette earned 17 all-Big East honors through top finishes in the meet between the two teams. That group was led by three individual champions. Daniel Armstrong completed his indoor four-peat in the high jump, clearing 2.10 meters to win as one of just two men to get over a two meter high bar. Sophomore Vinnie Voudrie won his first Big East title by getting 17.16 meters of distance in the weight throw. Junior Lindsey Mirkes made it a double MU championship in the high jump, securing the only event title for the women’s team with a winning leap of 1.68 meters.
BIG EAST CHAMPION Daniel Armstrong!
— Marquette TF/XC (@MUTFXC) March 3, 2020
Daniel took home is fourth consecutive BIG EAST indoor high jump championship this weekend!#gotafterit #wearemarquette pic.twitter.com/VLr3hml7RQ
BIG EAST CHAMPION Vinnie Voudrie!
— Marquette TF/XC (@MUTFXC) March 3, 2020
The super sophomore took home the men's weight throw title on Sunday at the SPIRE Institute for MU's first individual championship of the weekend.#WeAreMarquette | #GotAfterIt pic.twitter.com/LVK7OHYifu
BIG EAST High Jump CHAMPION @lmmirkes! The flying junior soared over 1.68 / 5-6 to take her first individual title! #gotafterit #wearemarquette pic.twitter.com/2SLAz4rvbh
— Marquette TF/XC (@MUTFXC) March 3, 2020
Marquette did serious damage in the field events, which is a pretty standard result for the Golden Eagles at the Big East conference meets. Check this action out:
- Women’s High Jump: 1-2-3
- Women’s Pole Vault: 2-4-5-7
- Women’s Long Jump: 2-3
- Women’s Triple Jump: 4-6
- Women’s Weight Throw: 2-4
- Men’s High Jump: 1-4-5-7
- Men’s Pole Vault: 3-4-5-6
- Men’s Long Jump: 2-4-5-7
- Men’s Triple Jump: 2-6-7
- Men’s Heptathlon: 2-3-5-6
Dang!
Along the way, Marquette set 16 top 10 program records, three freshmen records, and one school record. That last one belongs to freshman Zachariah Murry, who finished fourth in the 400 meters. Julian Wright and Imari Hurte got the other two freshman records, with Wright running the 200 meters in 21.78 seconds and Hurte clearing 7.37 meters in the long jump. Both of those are the second best marks in Marquette history in their respective events.
Setting program records or top 10 marks isn’t always the best measure of performance in track & field, as sometimes there’s nothing you can do when there’s somebody really really great in your event. To that end, I think it’s pretty flipping sweet that Marquette’s two teams also set 38 personal bests during the two day event.
BIG EAST Indoor by the numbers:
— Marquette TF/XC (@MUTFXC) March 3, 2020
38 Personal Records
17 All-BIG EAST Performers
16 MU All-Time Top-Ten Marks
4 Freshman Records
1 School Record
3 Individual BIG EAST Champions
2 BIG EAST Team Trophies#gotafterit
The next thing up on the track & field schedule is the NCAA indoor championships coming up on March 13th and 14th in New Mexico. It’s still to be determined how many Golden Eagles will be headed to compete in that, but I would presume that Daniel Armstrong will be a very likely candidate. It’s not about Big East championship performance, but about who has the best indoor marks overall to qualify for the national indoor meet. Outdoor season will begin on March 20th with a dual meet hosted by South Florida in Tampa.