Newcomers Set Pace in Opening Day of Holiday Inn Invitational

Lincoln ? In a day made up primarily of distance and unseeded field events, the Nebraska track and field team showed marked improvement from a week ago in their opening meet Friday at the Holiday Inn Invitational at the Bob Devaney Sports Center Track.

The Huskers swept the men’s and women’s mile events, with Anne Shadle winning the women’s race in 4:52.39 in her first race since coming off a successful cross country season. Sophomore Aaron Nasers captured the men’s race with a time of 4:12.82 to pick up his first win after transferring to Nebraska from Western Michigan this semester.

"I felt like our milers got off to a good start," Head Coach Gary Pepin said. "There were definitely areas where kids made an improvement from a week ago, so that is good to see. In some areas the athletes have worked really hard the last week and a half, so we got another good session out of tonight, but we didn’t necessarily get great marks."

Freshman Danute Ceika ran a solid race in the 800 meters to outperform the field by more than seven seconds. Junior Kayte Tranel took the runner-up spot in the 5,000-meter run with a personal-best time of 17:30.25.

Freshman Dmitrijs Milkevics won gold in the men’s 800 meter with a career-best time of 1:51.54. Teammate Danny Hill followed him in fourth place in 1:53.85.

The men’s 4x400 came out with a victory and a second-place finish from it’s A and B team. The A team, made up of Andy Nelson, Milkevics, Hill and Mark Harrison ran a winning time of 3:13.13.

Senior Tia DeSoto took third in the women’s seeded weight-throw with a mark of 58-8 ?, while current Huskers went 1-3-4 in the women’s seeded long jump. Ineta Radevica leaped 20-6 after recording a personal-best mark of 21-0 ? in last weekend’s meet. Freshman Angela Dies was third with a mark of 19-1 ? and Authea Chambers was fourth with a jump of 19-1 ?. Former Husker Krisztina Kovesi finished second.

Arturs Abolins won bronze in the men’s long jump with a leap of 23-1 ?. He was followed in fifth by Daniel Roper at 22-5 ?.

The Huskers will hit the Devaney Center Indoor Track at noon on Saturday when they wrap up the 2004 Holiday Inn Invitational.