May 12, 2013
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Vanessa McLeod and Brandon Winters earned spots on the podium for the Boilermakers on the final day of the Big Ten Championships. The Purdue men finished ninth with 56 points while the women were 10th with 37.
"I was pleased with our performance, especially from the men," head coach Lonnie Greene said. "We had kids in just about every final today and that's what gets me excited. We are lining up and competing. The only difference is that we lack a little bit of depth right now. We have one in each final whereas other schools have two or three kids lining up. That was the issue for us this year and that is what we are going to work towards in the future. At the end of the day, though, our kids performed well."
McLeod was the top finisher for the Boilermakers on Sunday. The freshman, who is the school record holder in the 800m run, qualified for the finals in the event on Saturday with the second fastest overall time. Sunday was the same story as she finished runner-up with a time of 2:07.62 to earn eight points for the women. McLeod's time was exactly one second behind the winning time run by Samantha Murphy of Illinois.
Winters found his way onto the podium after sneaking into the finals of the 110m hurdles. The junior qualified with the eighth-fastest time in the prelims. In the finals, though, he turned up the jets. Winters claimed the bronze medal after running a time of 14.05 seconds. That time was 0.35 second behind the winning time run by Vanier Joseph of Illinois.
Purdue also had a couple of competitors just miss the podium. Andre' Peart took fourth in the 400m hurdles just a day after shattering the school record in the event. Peart ran a time of 52.20 seconds in the finals which was just 0.18 second off the podium. The winning time was 50.78 seconds by Ethan Holmes of Iowa, the exact same time that Peart ran in the prelims. Cierra Brown also had a fourth place finish on Sunday. The freshman leapt 12.55m (41-02.00) in the triple jump to earn the women five points.
Eric Harris and Matthew McClintock scored in a pair of track events over the weekend. Harris qualified for Sunday's finals in the 100m and 200m dashes. He took fifth place in the 100m with a time of 10.50 seconds. Hours later, he finished seventh in the 200m dash with a time of 21.56 seconds. McClintock scored in the 10k on Friday as he finished sixth. Sunday, he took seventh in the 5k after running a time of 14:22.48. Dani Bunch is the only other Boilermaker to score in multiple events as she won the shot put and finished fourth in the hammer with a pair of PRs including a school record.
Kevin Griffith scored for the men in the 800m run. The junior qualified with the ninth-fastest time in the event on Saturday. Sunday, he finished seventh a picked up two points for the men after posting a time of 1:51.53. Mitch Erickson also had a seventh place finish on the final day of the championships. He recorded two points after clearing 5.06m (16-07.25) in the pole vault.
The men's shot putters had a solid day on Sunday as two of them finished in the points. Freshman Coy Blair finished fifth after throwing an outdoor PR of 18.33m (60-01.75). Senior Jakob Engel was just behind him. Engel took sixth with a mark of 18.31m (60-00.75). Jordan Roos also threw a PR in the event with a mark of 17.38m (57-00.25). That was good for 10th place.
"It was cold out, but we competed well and executed well," said Greene. "We scored in a lot of areas we didn't last year. Eric Harris and Matt McClintock scored twice for us, and that's a great thing. I'm really pleased with their performances. We lined up and competed and showed that we belong and that excites me for the future. We return the majority of our scoring next year. We will continue to recruit well and will fill some needs so that we have a deeper team next year. The group of underclassmen is a very talented one. They will continue to get better and with some key additions next year, we will continue to finish higher in the Big Ten."
The men's team made drastic improves from the 2012 Big Ten Championships. It improved its scoring by 40.5 points, a whopping 3.6 times as many points as a year ago. The improvement was 18 points better than any other team's scoring increase.
Nebraska won the men's team title with 131.5 points. Minnesota was runner-up with 93 points. Wisconsin rounded out the top three with 86.5 points.
On the women's side, Penn State took first place with 133 points. Illinois was second with 120 while Ohio State took third with 86 points.
"The first year for our staff in the Big Ten is in the books and overall, we had some remarkable improvements," Greene said. "We got the kids back in the mode of believing and competing. Now we head to the NCAA Regionals in Greensboro, N.C., and our goal is to advance as many kids to the NCAA Championships in Eugene, Ore., as possible. That is our major focus. We will see in the next week how many qualified for the regionals, but we will have strong representation and I am confident that we will represent Purdue University well."
The Boilermakers are off until the NCAA Regionals which begin May 23.