The Duke women's track and field team continues to make strides as it had its highest finish ever in the Atlantic Coast Conference indoor championship meet held this weekend in Greensboro.
The Blue Devils finished with eight points and tied for seventh place with Maryland. "They went out, competed, and gave everything they had," head coach Mike Forbes said.
"They weren't in awe of the competition and they performed well."
As expected, North Carolina won the meet with 152 points, its sixth title in seven years.
Duke senior Jeanne McFeely accumulated over half of the team's points as she raced to a fourth place finish in the 800-meters with a new school record of 2:13.66. McFeely's finish was the highest Duke finish ever in a running event at the ACC meet. While other runners flew to the front, McFeely paced herself and remained strong in the final lap, moving from seventh to fourth place in the final 200 meters.
"Making it to the finals was a big accomplishment," McFeely said. "It was nice to contribute to the team and add points."
Other scorers for the team included the eighth-place mile relay team of sophomore Nicola Crabtree, senior Christine Gregorski, senior Liz Lorscheider and freshman Kirsten Johnson, and the seventh-place distance medley team of senior Beth Berghausen, Gregorski, sophomore Betsy Keever and McFeely.
In addition to McFeely's record, three other school records were broken, 12 personal bests were set and nine performances were in the top five best performances ever at Duke.
Before McFeely ran her record-breaking time in the 800-meters, Keever broke the record in 2:14.88. Freshman Breanna Pearson broke both the freshman and school record in the triple jump when she jumped 35-8.75, two feet farther than her previous best. Sophomore Megan Mitchell threw the shot put 14 inches farther than she had ever thrown it before to break the shot put record with a 38-3.25 throw.
On the first day of competition, there was a four-hour delay when the newly built wooden track began to come apart. The 400-meter race, which was to take place at 3:25 p.m., was put off until 7:15 that evening while sections of the track were put back together. One 400 runner, Crabtree, found the delay frustrating, even though she came back to run a personal best 63.38.
"They kept telling us that we would be running in five or 10 minutes, so we continually had to stretch and keep warm," Crabtree said. "Every minute we had to wait made me more nervous. Finally at 5:45, they decided to postpone the race until 7:15. The coaches took us away from the track and we relaxed with each other until then, which helped me regain my concentration."
"I told [the 400 runners] they had worked much too hard to let this affect what was going to happen," assistant coach Scott Yakola said.
With only two indoor meets left in the season, the team is looking to fulfill new expectations after the performance at the ACC meet.
"We are so far ahead of where we have been in the past," Yakola said. "They were awesome this past weekend and I'm so proud of how they went after it."
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