Huskers Open with Holiday Inn Invitational

Huskers Open 2010 Season at Home

This weekend the No. 4 Nebraska men’s and No. 11 Nebraska women’s track and field teams will open the 2010 season in Lincoln at the Devaney Center Indoor Track, as they host the Holiday Inn Invitational.

 

Set to begin at 4 p.m. on Friday and Noon on Saturday, fans can purchase tickets on Huskers.com, by calling 1-800-8BIGRED or by stopping by the Nebraska Athletic Ticket Office, located directly west of Memorial Stadium. For more information and a complete meet schedule, as well as information about the rest of the 2010 season, log on to Huskers.com.

 

Pepin Back for 30th Season

The all-time winningest track and field coach in the history of the Big 12 and the former Big Eight Conference, Nebraska Head Coach Gary Pepin is entering his historic 30th season at NU. The longest tenured active coach in Cornhusker athletics, Pepin enters his 27th season as head coach of both the Husker men’s and women’s track teams.

 

For Pepin, last season he also passed Frank Sevigne as the longest-tenured head coach in the history of the Nebraska program, and Pepin is still at the top of his game for coaching athletes to the highest levels of competition. He was named 2009 Big 12 Men’s Outdoor Coach of the Year and the 2009 USTFCCCA Midwest Regional Men’s Outdoor Coach of the Year.

 

Huskers Ranked in Top-15

The Nebraska track and field team will open the 2010 indoor season with both the men’s and women’s teams ranked in the United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association top 25. The Husker men will start the season ranked No. 4 in the country, while the women’s squad is ranked No. 11. Florida State holds the men’s top spot, while conference rival Texas A&M is atop the women’s rankings.

 

Atop the Conference

After winning 51 Big Eight titles during the conference’s history from 1974-1996, the Huskers have continued to dominate since moving to the Big 12 Conference for the 1997 season. NU has won a league-high 21 team titles over the Big 12’s first 13 years, including the program’s historic 100th conference team title last season at the Big 12 Outdoor Championships, where the men’s team won in dominant fashion with four individual conference champions.

 

Bullock Back for No. 4

Senior Epley Bullock will look to make history in 2010, as the Allen, Texas, native will have a chance to become the first Husker on the women’s side in school history to earn four All-America honors in the indoor high jump.

 

Last season, Bullock joined Chris Hall (1991-93) as the only Huskers to achieve the feat three times.

 

Gordon Goes for Two

After winning just the second indoor long jump national title in school history on the men’s side in 2009, Nicholas Gordon will look to become the first Husker ever to win back-to-back titles in the event.

 

Carl Myerscough and Ineta Radevica were the last Huskers to win back-to-back NCAA titles, as Radevica took the outdoor triple jump and Myerscough the outdoor shot put, both in 2003 and 2004.

 

Gordon is also the returning Big 12 indoor and outdoor long jump champion. Chris Wright (1997-98) was the last Husker on the men’s side to win back-to-back titles in the indoor long jump. Gordon topped Wright’s meet record of 26-0 last season with his winning jump of 26-1 1/2.

 

17 Decades and Counting

The wealth of coaching knowledge at Nebraska is nearly unmatched as the Husker coaching staff holds a combined 170 years of coaching experience.

 

Stability has been key to the success of the track team as four of Head Coach Gary Pepin’s assistants have been with the program for 10 or more years and two for 20 years or longer, including Jay Dirksen (27th season), Mark Colligan (24th season), Billy Maxwell (15th season) and Matt Martin (14th season).