Jacks Take on League Championships this Weekend

Thursday, May 10

Tulsa, Okla.

Thurs: 8 a.m. | Fri: 10 a.m. | Sat: 11 a.m.

South Dakota State University

The Summit League Outdoor Championships

5/9/2018 2:30:00 PM | Men's Track and Field, Track and Field, Women's Track and Field

MEET 18: South Dakota State (Men & Women) at Summit League Outdoor Championships

When	Summit League Championships: Thursday, May 10: Track Events: 8 a.m. \| Field Events: 10 a.m. \| Multi Events: 10 a.m. Friday, May 11: Multi Events: 10 a.m. \| Field Events: 2 p.m. \| Track Events: 4:30 p.m. Saturday, May 12: Field Events: 11 a.m. \| Track Events: 12:20 p.m.
Where	ONEOK Sports Complex \| Google Maps \| Directions \| Tulsa, Okla.
Live Results	TimerHub.com - Will not be active until event starts
Live Stream	ORU Live Stream
Meet Notes	Meet Information \| Summit League Preview \| Event Schedule \| Heat Sheets
Social Media	Twitter \| Facebook \| Instagram \| #GoJacks

The South Dakota State track and field team travels to Tulsa, Okla. to compete in their 11th Summit League Outdoor Championships on May 10-12.

The Jackrabbits enter the weekend with five student-athletes leading The Summit League in seven events. Juniors Kyle Burdick (800m, 1,500m) and Rachel King (5,000m, 3,000S) each have two events a piece.

Both State distance runners are also sitting as runner-ups in another event, with Burdick 2.01 seconds behind the leader in the 5,000m and King 1.99 seconds from the 1,500m leader.

Burdick is coming into The Summit League Outdoor Championships after scoring 28 points at the indoor championships in Fargo, N.D., winning the indoor mile, 3,000m and runner-up behind sophomore teammate Chase Cayo in the 5,000m.

At the 2017 outdoor championships, the Rapid City, S.D. native claimed both the 1,500m and 10,000m championships and finished runner-up in the 5,000m to tally 28 points and earn the league's athlete of the year, track championship MVP, and all-league honors.

King is coming into the outdoor championships after winning the indoor league championship mile, 3,000m, and runner-up in the 5,000m.

During the 2017 outdoor championships, King finished 10th in the 1,500m.

Junior Kasie Vollmer was runner-up in the discus at the 2017 championships and comes into the 2018 championship weekend with league's third-best throw.

Sophomore Jaymie O'Connor has the league's fourth-best 100m hurdles mark, which is her PR, as the 2018 outdoor campaign comes to a close. She finished third in the 60m hurdles at the 2018 indoor championships and second in the 100m hurdles at the 2017 outdoor championship with her then-personal-best mark.

Junior Krista Steele is entering the weekend with the league's best time in the 800m. She has won the indoor 800m and finished sixth in the 2017 outdoor championships.

Sophomore Chase Cayo has the league's best 10,000m, 0.67 seconds better than senior teammate Trevor Capra, who is second on the performance list. They are 1:23.96 and 1:23.29 minutes faster than the rest of the league in the event.

Capra finished third and Cayo finished sixth in the 2017 outdoor championships.

Senior Vanessa Lane has the league's best score in the heptathlon after finishing third, with her personal-best and the school record, in the 2017 outdoor championships and third in the 2018 indoor pentathlon.

Sophomore Bryant Courter is coming back to The Summit League Championships after winning the 2017 championship long jump and triple jump and finished fourth in the high jump and winning the field championship MVP and newcomer to the championship award.

Courter tallied 26 points in the 2018 indoor championships, earning championship field MVP. He enters the weekend with the league's second-best long and triple jumps.

Seniors Colton Bender and Mason Leiseth scored points for the Jackrabbits in last year's outdoor championships with Leiseth finishing seventh in the discus and ninth in the shot put, and Bender adding a fifth-place finish in the hammer.

Bender won the weight throw while Leiseth recorded runner-up in the shot put at the 2018 indoor championships. Now, Bender is ranked second in the hammer and Leiseth is fifth in the discus and sixth in the shot put for this year's league performance list.

Sophomore Landon Larson finished the 2017 outdoor championships with a third-place finish in the 200m and a fifth-place finish in the 100m. This year, Larson has the league's ninth-best runs in the 100m and 200m, while eighth in the 400m.

As a team the SDSU men finished second in the 2017 outdoor championships and in the 2018 indoor championships. The team was predicted to finish the outdoor championships in third for 2018.

The women's squad finished third at the 2017 outdoor championships and fourth in the 2018 indoor championships. They were predicted to finish third for this year's outdoor championships.

Watch Via Live Stream
Oral Roberts will provide a live stream of the meet on their athletic website. Click here or see the box above to go to the broadcast.

Schedule
Events will begin at 8 a.m. on Thursday with the women's 10,000m and followed by the men's 10,000m, which were originally scheduled for 7:45 p.m.

The multi-events are scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. (women's heptathlon) and 10:30 a.m. (men's decathlon). For the heptathlon, there will be four events on Thursday, then the final three events on Friday starting at 11 a.m.

The men's decathlon will also start on Thursday with the first five events at 10:30 a.m. and wrap up on Friday at 10 a.m.

Also starting at 10 a.m. will be the women's hammer throw.

The men's hammer throw (1:30 p.m.) will also be on Thursday with the women's javelin (3:30 p.m.), women's pole vault (4:30 p.m.), and men's javelin (5:30 p.m.).

Friday will have both men's and women's long jump, high jump, and discus running from 2 p.m. through 6 p.m. for field events.

Action on the track will start at 4:30 p.m. with the women's 100m hurdles prelims and run through the men's 3,000m steeplechase at 7 p.m. Included on Friday will be both men's and women's prelims of the 100m/110m hurdles, 400m, 100m, 800m, 400m hurdles, 200m, and the finals of the men's and women's 3,000m steeplechases.

On the final day of competition at ONEOK Sports Complex, the field events will sport the women's shot put and triple jump at 11 a.m., the men's pole vault at 11:30 a.m., and the men's shot put and triple jump at 1 p.m.

Track action on Saturday will include the 4x100m relays, 1,500m, all of the championship races from Friday, the 5,000m, and conclude with the 4x400m relays - with the men's race schedule last at 3:25 p.m.

The team awards ceremony will be after the last race, approximately at 3:30 p.m.

A full schedule can be found here, or in the box at the top.

Parking
Parking for spectators will be available in E, F-1, F-2 and G Lots.

Entrances
The spectator entrance will be the Southwest Gate of the ONEOK Sports Complex.

Ticket Prices
Admission is $5 per person (Children 5 and under free).

Merchandise
A limited amount of championship apparel will be available for sale at the championship.

Up Next
For the Jackrabbits that qualify, the NCAA West Regionals are scheduled in Sacramento, Calif. on May 24-26. As of right now, seven Jacks qualify for competition.

Ranked Jackrabbits
South Dakota State has seven Jackrabbits in the top 48 regionally of their respective events. The top 48 individuals (top 24 multi-event athletes and relay teams) in the West Region at the end of the season will qualify for the NCAA West Preliminaries on May 24-26 in Sacramento, Calif.

Last year, South Dakota State had eight NCAA West qualifiers competing in eight events on the men's side, while the women's team had five qualifiers competing in five events.

Junior Kyle Burdick and sophomore Bryant Courter competed each compete in two events, with Burdick reach the NCAA Outdoor Championships in the 1,500m.

Junior Kasie Vollmer was within 1-07.00 feet from qualifying for the outdoor championships in the discus throw.

Men
1,500m: Jr. Kyle Burdick - 3:44.78 (West: 41st, NCAA: 81st)
Pole Vault: Fr. Trent Francom - 17-02.75 (West: 23rd, NCAA: 43rd)
Long Jump: So. Bryant Courter - 24-07.25 (West: 44th, NCAA: 88th)
Hammer Throw: Sr. Colton Bender - 206-09.00 (West: 23rd, NCAA: 52nd)
Outside the top 48, inside the top 100
100m: Fr. Daniel Clarke - 10.56 (West: 73rd, Top 48 Mark: 10.46)
100m: So. Sam Zenner - 10.60 (West: 84th, Top 48 Mark: 10.46)
800m: Jr Kyle Burdick - 1:51.23 (West: 86th, Top 48 Mark: 1:49.98)
5,000m: Kyle Burdick - 14:05.14 (West: 67th, Top 48 Mark: 13:58.77)
10,000m: So. Chase Cayo - 29:38.99 (West: 52nd, Top 48 Mark: 29:34.00)
10,000m: Sr. Trevor Capra - 29:39.66 (West: 56th, Top 48 Mark: 29:34.00)
3,000S: So. Micah Mather - 9:12.28 (West: 85th, Top 48 Mark: 8:58.27)
High Jump: Sr. J.J. Hejna - 6-07.00 (West: 90th, Top 48 Mark: 6-10.75)
Triple Jump: So. Bryant Courter - 49-07.25 (West: 49th, Top 48 Mark: 49-07.75)
Shot Put: Sr. Mason Leiseth - 57-04.75 (West: 51st, Top 48 Mark: 57-07.75)
Shot Put: R-Fr. Noah Huber - 55-05.75 (West: 72nd, Top 48 Mark: 57-07.75)
Discus: Sr. Mason Leiseth - 169-05.00 (West: 77th, Top 48 Mark: 174-10.00)
Hammer: Sr. Logan Ammons - 192-00.00 (West: 60th, Top 48 Mark: 197-08.00)
Javelin: So. Dakota Leonhard - 183-02.00 (West: 93rd, Top 48 Mark: 202-05.00)
4x100m Relay: Hilton, Larson, Clarke, Zenner (West: 95th, Top 24** Mark: 39.78)
Decathlon: So. Evan Hieber - 6,299 (West: 56th, Top 24* Mark: 6,908)
*Top 24 go to the NCAA Outdoor Championships in the multi-events
** Top 24 go to the NCAA Outdoor Prelims in the relay events

Women
800m: Jr. Krista Steele - 2:07.55 (West: 35th, NCAA: 78th)
5,000m: Jr. Rachel King - 16:09.54 (West: 31st, NCAA: 50th)
3,000m Steeplechase: Jr. Rachel King - 10:01.14 (West: 7th, NCAA: 11th, World: 34th)
Discus: Jr. Kasie Vollmer - 166-10.00 (West: 48th, NCAA: 82nd)
Outside the top 48, inside the top 100
800m: Sp. Kendra Dykstra - 2:09.37 (West: 33rd, Top 48 Mark: 2:08.14)
1,500m: Jr. Rachel King - 4:26.43 (West: 81st, Top 48 Mark: 4:22.88)
100H: So. Jaymie O'Connor - 14.00 (West: 92nd, Top 48 Mark: 13.68)
Hammer: Jr. Abby Sudbeck - 180-10.00 (West: 61st, Top 48 Mark: 187-00.00)
Heptathlon: Sr. Vanessa Lane - 5,029 (West: 36th, Top 24* Mark: 5,213)
*Top 24 go to the NCAA Outdoor Championships in the multi-events

There are 18 SDSU student-athletes and one relay team who are not in the top 48 (top 24 for relays teams), but in the top 100 of the West Region.

USTFCCCA Regional Rankings
The USTFCCCA.org ranked South Dakota State 16th on the men's side, and 17th on the women's side in week five of the Midwest Regional rankings. The men remained in the same spot as last week, while the women's team moved up one spot.

Six Jackrabbits are ranked top-eight individually in the region.

2. Jr. Rachel King (3,000S)
4. Jr. Kyle Burdick (1,500m)
5. So. Chase Cayo (10,000m)
7. Jr. Rachel King (5,000m)
7. Sr. Trevor Capra (10,000m)
7. Fr. Trent Francom (PV)
8. Sr. Colton Bender (HT)

#EventSquad Rankings
The USTFCCCA.org ranks the top four student-athletes in each event, from all of the Division I schools and ranks them. In order to be ranked in an event, the team must have four qualified student-athletes in that specific event.

The men's team has four of 14 eligible events ranked in the top 50, including the 10,000m squad (18th), the shot put squad (39th), the 3,000m steeplechase squad (42nd) and the high jump squad (45th). Pole vault (52nd) and long jump (58th) are close to making the top 50.

On the women's side, the Jacks have nine of the 12 eligible events in the top 100. The hammer throw (41st), discus (58th), and shot put (64th) squads are the lowest rankings for SDSU.

Summit League Leaders
State has 12 student-athletes, including four event leaders, and three relay teams ranked in the top three of the league as The Summit League Outdoor Championships approach this weekend.

Men (7 Individuals/12 Top-Threes)
1. Jr. Kyle Burdick (800m)
1. Jr. Kyle Burdick (1,500m)
1. So. Chase Cayo (10,000m)
2. Jr. Kyle Burdick (5,000m)
2. Sr. Trevor Capra (10,000m)
2. So. Micah Mather (3,000S)
2. Sr. Colton Bender (HT)
T-2. So. Bryant Courter (LJ)
3. Fr. Daniel Clarke (100m)
3. So. Bryant Courter (TJ)

3. 4x100m Relay
3. 4x400m Relay

Women (5 Individuals/8 Top-Threes)
1. Jr. Krista Steele (800m)
1. Jr. Rachel King (5,000m)
1. Jr. Rachel King (3,000S)
1. Sr. Vanessa Lane (Hept.)
2. So. Kendra Dykstra (800m)
2. Jr. Rachel King (1,500m)
3. Jr. Kasie Vollmer (DT)

3. 4x400m Relay

Some of the notable marks on the performance list include:
Men: Jackrabbits have at least one student-athlete in the top five of 15 of the 21 events ... Clarke and Zenner go 3-4 in the 100m … the 800m is filled with three Jackrabbits, Burdick leads the event by 0.28 seconds, Goehring is within 0.64 seconds of the second-best 800m mark ... Burdick leads the 1,500m by 0.44 seconds, and within 2.01 seconds of the best mark in the 5,000m ... Jacks have three of the five best marks in the 10,000m (1. Cayo, 2. Capra, 5. Ivanecky) ... Cayo leads the league in the 10,000m with Capra 0.67 seconds behind him - their marks are 1:23.96 and 1:23.29 minutes better than the third-best mark … the 4x100m relay has the top-three spots within one second of each other, SDSU is in third with the school record ... USD and SDSU have the only pole vaulters over 17 feet (Francom - 17-02.75) ... Courter is within 2.50 inches of the best mark in the long jump and 11.50 inches from the triple jump.

Women: As a team, the Jacks have four event leaders, which is third most behind NDSU (7) and ORU (6) ... Flemister-Smith ran her first career 400m, which is fourth-best on the performance list ... Steele is leading the league in the 800m by 1.82 seconds … Dykstra is right in second in the 800m, the only event the Jacks go 1-2 … Dykstra is also in fourth place in the 1,500m, while King is in second ... King leads the 5,000m by 36.97 seconds and the 3,000S by 28.25 seconds ... individually, King (5,000m & 3,000S) and ORU's Etim (100m & 200m) and Abire (LJ & TJ) are the only student-athletes leading the league in multiple events ... Lane is leading the heptathlon by 224 points.

Record Breakers
The Jackrabbits have recorded a total of 68 school top 10 marks so far in 2018, including both men and women and indoor and outdoor.

Men ITF Top 10 Marks: 27
Women ITF Top 10 Marks: 21
Men OTF Top 10 Marks: 15
Women OTF Top 10 Marks: 16

SDSU has also reset 10 school records during 2018.

Men Indoor School Records: 3
Women Indoor School Records: 4
Men Outdoor School Records: 4
Women Outdoor School Records: 3

Junior Rachel King is leading the charge for resetting the school records. She is responsible for three school records indoor and two outdoor records (IN: Mile, 3,000m, 5,000m, OUT: 3,000m steeplechase, 5,000m). She added a personal-best mark in the 1,500m, which is second on the school's all-time list.

Senior Colton Bender reset the school record for indoor weight throw four times throughout the indoor season and has reset the school record for outdoor hammer throw twice this season, having first set the school record in 2017.

Sophomore Bryant Courter also was resetting school records during the indoor season in the triple jump. Throughout the season, he reset the school record four times and etched his name on three meet records (including in the indoor league championship record).

Courter also posted personal-best top 10 marks in the high jump and long jump indoors.

As for outdoors, he has tied his personal-best in the long jump, which is third all-time, and is within 7.50 inches of his personal-best triple jump, which is also third all-time.

Freshman Daniel Clarke has added top 10 marks in both the indoor and outdoor long jump marks, posting fourth all-time indoors and a tie for ninth-best outdoors.

In the last weekend of the outdoor season, Clarke put his name in the school's top 10 on the 100m and as the third leg of the 4x100m relay.

Junior Krista Steele finally got the school record in the indoor 800m at the league championships, chasing teammate Oksana Covey's 2017 mark all year. She also was within 0.10 seconds of tying Covey's school record in the indoor 600m.

Steele has reset her outdoor 800m personal-best mark twice already this season, jumping into second all-time. She also notched a PR in the 1,500m, the same weekend she first reset her outdoor 800m PR.

For relay teams, Steele added a school record in the distance medley and third-best all-time 4x800m relay. Both of them were ran at the Drake Relays.

Freshman Trent Francom is making a big freshman splash, finishing with a share of the school record in the indoor pole vault with his big jump in the indoor championships. He is sharing the record with his brother, Reagan Francom and Lynn Olson.

As for the outdoor season, he broke the school record wide open at Drake with school's first-ever mark over 17 feet. He increased the school record by 5.50 inches.

Senior Mason Leiseth and redshirt Noah Huber have been juggling spots in the top 10 for shot put. Leiseth started out the outdoor season as 10th-best on the list, but Huber added his name to third-best the list, which kicked Leiseth off the list.

In California (April 19-20), Leiseth recorded a PR on Thursday right behind Huber for fourth. The next day, he added another 1-02.25 feet to the PR, which carved his name into second all-time.

At Mount Marty (April 25), he added another 1-01.50 feet to his PR to tie the school record. He's added 2-03.75 feet to his best throw in six days.

Leiseth is also eighth on the discus top 10 and second in the indoor shot put, ahead of his father, Dave Leiseth, who is now fifth, and Huber, who is third.

Season Wrap-Up
South Dakota State made the most of the 2018 outdoor season so far, despite being at the mercy of the abnormal weather this season.

The Jackrabbits kicked off the season where they are starting the post-season - Tulsa, Okla. The Jackrabbits compete against several Big XII and Summit League schools at the Tulsa Duals, beating all of the schools on the men's side and beating five-of-six on the women's side.

The men's 4x100m relay team added their first school top 10 mark of many, posting the school's then-second-best time, now third.

State then had its first weather change, going back to Tulsa - this time ORU, after the SMSU Mustang Open had been canceled due to weather. A small group of Jacks traveled to California to compete in the Distance Carnival and Stanford Invite.

In the first look of the newly built ONEOK Sports Complex, 13 Jackrabbits tallied 22 personal-bests, with senior Vanessa Lane competing in four events - scoring personal-bests and leading the team in two.

Sophomores Haley Mottinger and Kayla Neff scored the most personal-best marks with three each - every event they competed in.

As for the student-athletes in Stanford and San Francisco, Calif., junior Rachel King stole the show with her personal-best mark in the 3,000m steeplechase which was ranked in 21st in the world, fifth in the NCAA, and first in The Summit League. For her performance, King was the lone Jackrabbit to win a Summit League Athlete of the Week honor.

The Dakota Duals scheduled on April 7 were also canceled because of poor weather, so SDSU hosted an exhibition against South Dakota. However, on the following Wednesday, the Jackrabbits made a trip to Vermillion, S.D. to compete in the impromptu South Dakota Invite.

Senior Colton Bender first reset his 2017 school record in the hammer throw at the Invite with the school's first throw over 200 feet. Fellow senior Mason Leiseth posted a PR in the discus to re-establish his name on the school's top 10 at ninth.

Instead of competing in the Lyle Hokanson Classic, the track team waited until the following weekend and made another trip out to California.

Senior Vanessa Lane and sophomore Evan Hieber posted their first and only regular season multi-event marks, with Hieber adding a PR score that finished seventh on the school's all-time list and Lane scoring the league's best mark.

Junior Rachel King and sophomore Kendra Dykstra put the second-best and fourth-best times on the school's top 10 in the 1,500m while junior Krista Steele reset the school record in the 800m.

Sophomores Miatta Flemister-Smith and Jaymie O'Connor also posted personal-best marks in the top 10. Flemister-Smith improved both her 100m and 200m, and almost added a 400m top 10 mark. O'Connor reset her school record in the 100m hurdles.

Leiseth reset his PR in the shot put and discus - second all-time in the shot put and fourth in the discus.

On the same weekend, some Jackrabbits traveled to Northern State and tallied 14 event winners.

SDSU competed at three meets in the last weekend in April: the Mount Marty Twilight, Drake Relays, and Kip Janvrin Open.

The relay teams highlighted the Drake Relays with Jacks scoring eight relay marks in the top 10. Freshman Trent Francom was the first Jack to break the 17-foot barrier in the pole vault and junior Kyle Burdick was the first 1,500m winner since 2005. Bender also reset his school record yet again in the hammer.

Last weekend, the last time to compete before the league championships, the State runners didn't stop adding PR's. Kendra Dykstra finished with the school's fourth-best mark in the 800m while Burdick added the seventh-best in the event on the men's side.

The 4x100m relay team that finished with the school's second-best mark - short by 0.03 seconds - at the Drake Relays, went to Nebraska in hopes of gathering that school record. In return, they broke the 2015 record by 0.07 seconds. (1. R-Fr. Coby Hilton, 2. So. Landon Larson, 3. Fr. Daniel Clarke, 4. So. Sam Zenner)

Clarke, also added the school's fourth-best time in the 100m.

Now the Jackrabbits will start the post-season where it all started - in Tulsa, Okla. - on Thursday in hopes of scoring points for the team and making qualifying marks for the NCAA West Regionals.

-GoJacks.com-