NSU women’s track and field finding their stride

It’s taken fourth-year Nicholls women’s track and field coach Scott Williamson time, but he’s finally seeing the results he’s wanted all along.

The Colonels won their first meet in school history at the Mississippi College Invite on April 6.

“Overall, I was extremely pleased with the results of the meet. It was the first time in a while that we have competed in a scored event and it was great to pick up a win,” Williamson said. “It was a great tune-up for our team and I think we are running well this early in the season. We will need to continue our speed and endurance training and improve in some key areas.”

His team followed the historic first at Mississippi College with a strong showing at the University of South Alabama Invitational this weekend, in which javelin tosser Leslie Bourgeois set a new meet record on her way to first place.

Bourgeois had a season-best throw of 46.98 meters, just one inch shy of the USA Senior qualifying mark. Bourgeois has had a top three finish in every meet this season.

Also performing well in the javelin throw was newly acquired freshman Danielle Daigle.

Daigle placed third in the event with a throw of 41 meters.

Kadi Whisnant placed second and broke the school record in the 3,000-meter steeplechase event with a time of 12:19.03. The previous school record was set in 2002 by Johanna Sjögren at the SLC Championships.

In the 400-meter hurdles event, Sabrina Henkes broke her personal best school record with a time of 1:04.16, good enough for second place in the event.

The Nicholls 4×400-meter relay team placed second at the meet with a time of 3:53.63. The mark moved the relay team to second in the school’s Top-5 list and was just .31 of a second short of breaking the school record.

Other notable performances included Jarina Guilbeau’s 15.25 mark in the 100-meter hurdles competition which landed her a fourth place finish and Imma Kosgei’s third place finish in the 1500-meter run with a time of 4:51.20.

In the Mississippi College meet, Williamson credited a joint team effort in the win.

The Colonels won the meet by finishing with 183 total points and placing first out of six teams. The final results were: 1) Nicholls 2) Mississippi College 3) Mississippi Valley State 4) Jackson State 5) Hinds CC 6) Alcorn State.

Out of the 13 events the Colonels competed in, Nicholls took home first place honors in nine.

The women’s 4x100m relay team of Tiffany Nall, Ashley Carpenter, Samantha Calhoun, and Naomi Green placed first in the competition and broke the school record with a time of 46.46.

Henkes rewrote the record books again with her school record personal best time of 1:04.28, which earned a first place finish in the 400-meter hurdles event.

In the 1500-meter run, Kosgei placed first with a mark of 4:52 and Lauren Jones followed in second place, improving her personal best time with a 4:55.30 showing.

True freshman Samantha Calhoun placed first with a time of 12.38 in the 100-meter dash. Calhoun currently sits at third in the school’s record books. Calhoun also placed first in the 200m dash with a time of 25.90.

Bourgeois also took home first place at that meet with a mark of 42.67 meters.

Nicholls will travel to Lawrence, Kansas tomorrow to compete in the much anticipated Kansas Relays hosted by the University of Kansas. The event will start Thursday and conclude Saturday.

“I thought we had really good meets and it was great tune-ups prior to the Kansas Relays,” Williamson said. “We competed against some great competition and I was really impressed by the hard work of our athletes.”