McNeese State picked up its share of first places in its own Cowboy Indoor invitational track and field meet on Friday at the Ralph O. Ward Rec Complex and a total of three complex records were broken.
Claiming titles for the Cowboys were Jacob Domingue in the shot put, the distance medley relay team, Charles Jackson in the 200 meters and David Rooney in the 3000 meters.
And, producing victories for the Cowgirls were DeAnn Washington in the shot put, Erin Kleckley in the pole vault, Christi McRae in the 200 meters and Amy Guinn in the 3000 meters.
McRae and Jackson were credited with complex records along with Northwestern State’s 4x400 meter relay team. McRae won the 200 meters in 25.59, and Jackson, now in his first season with the Cowboys after transferring from Northwestern State, won the men’s 200 meters in 22.77.
The Demon relay team of Michael Batts, Jamie Emery, Charles Green and Chris Pearson posted a 3:15.0 effort for a first place and a complex record.
“I really haven’t had a chance to sit down and see just how we finished,” said McNeese head coach Brendon Gilroy, who was also serving as the meet director.
“But, I think that we did very good and it was a good start to our season. I thought that we did good in the distance races and I saw where we won some sprint events.
“All in all, I think that we’re going to have a much improved team this season.”
Besides the Cowboys and the Cowgirls, also competing in the meet were squads from South Alabama, Northwestern State, UL Lafayette and Southern Miss. Alcorn State and Grambling were no shows.
Domingue, now in his sophomore season with the Cowboys, won the shot put with a personal best throw of 53-4 while Washington won the women’s shot at 41-8.
The Cowboy distance medley team of Kenneth Pierce, Karl Stewart, Johnathan Koenck and Ryan Barrow posted a 10:40.63 clocking for their first.
Kleckley won the women’s pole vault at 10-6 and Guinn produced her victory in the 3000 meters with a 10:54.73 effort.
The Cowboys had a one through six place finish in the men’s 3000 meters as Jordan Neil, Johnathan Koenck, Pierce, Barrow and Jarrett LeBlanc followed him across the finish line.
Some of other top performances for the Cowboys and Cowgirls came from the women’s 4x400 meter relay team of Whitney McKinney, LaDonna Carroll, McRae and Courtney Coleman with a second place 3:59.18 time, from Tinette Burger with a second in the 3000 meters, from Adrea Myers and Kayla Fontenot with a third and fourth in the women’s 55 meter hurdles and from Brittany Kleckley with a second in the women’s pole vault.
One of the better performances of the meet was a 16-10 pole vault by Chris Roy of Louisiana-Lafayette.