Huskers Host Final Regular Season Home Meet

Meet: Nebraska Tune-Up (meet schedule - pg. 5 of notes)
Where: Lincoln, Neb. (Devaney Center Indoor Track)
When: Friday, Feb. 18 (12:30 p.m.
Live Results: Huskers.com

Lincoln - The Nebraska track and field team will finish the home slate of the 2011 regular season on Friday, Feb. 18 when it hosts the Nebraska Tune-Up at the Devaney Center Indoor Track. The one-day meet is schedule to start at 12:30 p.m. with the women's DMR, while the field events start at 2 p.m. with the men's weight throw and women's long jump.

Live results will be available on Huskers.com, while tickets can still be purchased on Huskers.com, by calling 1-800-8BIGRED or by stopping by the Nebraska Athletic Ticket Office.

Raising the Bar
For the third week in a row the Husker record book was rewritten at the Texas A&M Challenge on Saturday, Feb. 12, as senior Natalie Willer broke her own school record of 14-3 ¼ in the pole vault with a clearance at 14-3 ½.

Willer was in a class all her own, with no other vaulter in the field clearing higher than 13-1 ½. The Elkhorn, Neb., native cleared her first three bars of the competition on her first attempts, including 13-1 ½, 13-6 ¼ and 13-11. After failing to break her 2009 record at three previous meets this season, Willer conquered the bar on her second attempt to improve on her own school record. Willer ended the meet with three tries at 14-5 ½, but was unable to succeed.

Latvian Leaper
Ventspils, Latvia, native Mara Griva has had a breakout freshman season for the Huskers in the horizontal jumps with a pair of top-10 national marks. Griva is tied for fifth in the country on the long jump list with a leap of 20-9 1/4 and sits eighth in the triple jump with a clearance of 42-8 1/4. Both marks are tops by a freshman this season nationally, while she is also third in both events on the Big 12 performance list.

NCAA Ticket Punched
Four Huskers have secured a spot a the NCAA Indoor Championships in College Station, Texas.

Senior Natalie Willer was the first Husker to put her name in the field with an automatic-qualifying mark of 14-1 1/4 in the pole vault at the Holiday Inn Invitational. Willer has since improved her standing with a vault of 14-3 1/2, which ties her for fourth nationally.

Junior Luke Pinkelman also secured his second career trip to the national meet at the Holiday Inn Invitational with a personal-best toss of 63-6 1/4 in the shot put. Pinkelman bettered the mark at the Razorback Invitational with the third-best throw in the county at 64-0 1/4.

Nicholas Gordon added his name to the list with a leap of 26-0 in the long jump at the Razorback Invitational. The 2009 NCAA indoor champion in the event, Gordon currently ranks ninth in the nation.

Chantae McMillan was the latest to lock up a spot with her school-record pentathlon score of 4,378 points at the Frank Sevigne Husker Invitational. McMillan earned All-American honors in the event at the 2009 national meet.

Jumps-U
The Huskers' high, long and triple jumpers are all over the NCAA performance list, as seven jumpers have posted nine top-25 marks.

True freshman Mara Griva leads the way as the Latvia native owns the fifth-best long jump in the country at 20-9 1/4 and is ranked eighth in the triple jump (42-8 1/4). Joining Griva on the list are Chantae McMillan (long jump-9th), Paul Hamilton (high jump-15th), Nicholas Gordon (long jump-9th), Chris Phipps (long jump-10th and triple jump-12th), Bobby Carter (long jump-19th) and Seth Wiedel (long jump-22nd).

McMillan Pours in the Points
The NU record book was rewritten for the second straight week during the first day of the 36th Annual Frank Sevigne Husker Invitational, as Chantae McMillan scored 4,378 points in the women's pentathlon to break the Nebraska record and post the fifth-best score all-time by a collegiate athlete.

McMillan broke Ashley Selig's 2006 record of 4,336 points and would go on to be named the meet's Most Valuable Performer on the women's side. A senior from Rolla, Mo., McMillan automatically qualified for the NCAA Indoor Championships with the score and moved to second on the 2011 NCAA list behind Oregon's Brianna Theisen, who recently set the NCAA record in the pentathlon with a score of 4,507 points at the UW Invitational. On her way to breaking the school record, McMillan set personal bests in the 60 hurdles (8.63) and 800 meters (2:23.91), while also tying her best in the high jump (5-7).

Adams Rewrite Record Book
Already the NU record holder in the indoor 5,000 meters, David Adams re-wrote the NU record book once again with a time of 7:58.62 in the 3,000 meters at the Razorback Invitational. The time broke Jacques van Rensburg's 1990 record of 8:03.70. Adams' time ranks 14th on the NCAA list this season.

Know How to Throw
The Husker throws squad it well represented on the NCAA top-50 list with five athletes in the shot put and one in the weight throw.

Luke Pinkelman leads the way with the third best shot put mark in the country at 63-6 1/4. Pinkelman is joined on the men's top-25 list by Tyler Hitchler and Chad Wright, who share the No. 22 spot with throws of 59-2 1/4.

On the women's side, Amanda Latsch and Annie Jackson are both in the top-50 of the women's shot. Latsch ranks 19th with a toss of 52-6 1/2 and Jackson sits 36th with a throw of 50-10. In the women's weight throw, Victoria Zimmerman is ranked 43rd with a toss of 61-7.

102 and Counting
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 in 1997. NU has won a league-high 22 team titles during the Big 12's 14-year history, including the program's historic 100th conference team title in 2007.

The Huskers added their 101st and 102nd titles during the 2009 and 2010 outdoor seasons when they became the first men's team in Big 12 history to win back-to-back team titles at the outdoor conference meet.

All-America Pipeline
Nebraska has been a staple at the NCAA Indoor Championships as the men's team alone has produced 113 All-America awards.  The men's squad has been on quite a roll as they have had at least one athlete earn All-American honors at the past 20 national meets. Since the indoor championships began in 1965, the Huskers have failed to leave with at least one All-America award on just five occasions, including 1975, 1982, 1983, 1984 and 1990.

The women's team has been just as good indoors since the national meet started in 1980. Along with three straight national titles from 1982 to 1984, the Huskers have two or more All-Americans at every meet except for 2002 when they failed to earn a honor.

Lopes-Schliep Tops World List
Former Husker national champion and 2008 Olympic bronze medalist Priscilla Lopes-Schliep was picked as the No. 1 women's 100-meter hurdler in the world on the recently released Track and Field News World Rankings for the 2010 season. Lopes-Schliep was one of four former Huskers listed on the top-10 world list, as three-time triple jump national champion Ineta Radevica (Latvia) was fifth in the long jump, two-time outdoor national champion Becky Breisch (US) was seventh in the discus while eight-time All-American and 2008 indoor high jump national champion Dusty Jonas (US) was ninth in the high jump.