Lopes Earns Weekly Big 12 Honor

Dallas, Texas ? Junior Priscilla Lopes, the defending NCAA champion in the 60-meter hurdles, was named the Big 12 Female Track and Field Athlete of the Week for her performance at last weekend’s Holiday Inn Invitational. Lopes received indoor recognition for the first time in her career.

 

The Whitby, Ontario, Canada, native won both the 60-meter hurdles and 200-meter dash at the invitational hosted by NU at the Bob Devaney Sports Center Indoor Track. Lopes reached the NCAA provisional qualifying mark for the hurdles in each of her three heats, posting times of 8.37, 8.33 and 8.18. She recorded a time of 24.18 in the 200. Lopes ranks first in the Big 12 Conference’s performance list for both the 60-meter hurdles and the 200.

In her first season as a Husker in 2004, Lopes claimed the NCAA title in the 60-meter hurdles with a school-record time of 7.96 at the NCAA Indoor Championships. She later added a silver-medal performance in the 100-meter hurdles at the 2004 NCAA Outdoor Championships, while later representing Canada in the 100-meter hurdles at the Olympic Games in Athens, Greece.

Fabrice Lapierre from Texas A&M won the men’s weekly award after claiming an NCAA automatic qualifying mark in the long jump at last weekend’s Arkansas Invitational.