For Immediate Release
Monday, May 11, 2015
NSIC Media Relations
Final Results
Championship Website
Photos

Sioux Falls, S.D.  - The University of Mary won its fourth straight NSIC/US Bank Outdoor Track & Field Championships behind a dominate performance at Lillibridge Track & Field Complex. The Marauders amassed 162 points to win by 53 points over second place Augustana.  Six new NSIC records were set during the two day championship. 

U-Mary’s  Danylle Kurywchak set a new record in the triple jump as he leaped 41-4.50 to break the 2009 record of 39-11.25 set by St. Cloud State’s Heather Miller. The Marauder’s 4X400m relay team of Cassandra Jones, Kathryn Stewart, Josie Guptill, and Melanie Rodriguez also set new record of 3:44.26, breaking the 2012 MSU Moorhead record of 3:47.98.

The NCAA National Championships will take place on May 21-23 in Allendale, Mich. hosted by Grand Valley State University.  The entire field for the NCAA Championships will be announced on Tuesday, May 12 at 5 p.m. on NCAA.com.

NSIC Team Notes
Augustana
Augustana placed second after the final day of the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference Outdoor Track and Field Championships. The Vikings collected 109 points as two Vikings set new NSIC records this past weekend starting off with Leah Seivert who battled against Northern State’s Sasha Hovind in the 10k but broke away the final two laps to set a new NSIC record, and win the women’s 10,000-meter run to open the conference championships. The Sibley, Iowa native also clocked a time of 34:55.57 to shatter the 35:27.70 record by running against Minnesota Duluth’s Morgan Place set back in 2010.
Augustana now awaits the NCAA release of national-meet qualifiers for the 2015 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships which will take place in Allendale, Mich. on May 21-23.
 
Bemidji State
Junior Hailey Horob broke the Bemidji State University pole vault record to headline the BSU contingent at the NSIC/US Bank Outdoor Track and Field Championships, May 8-9 at Lillibridge Track and Field Complex in Sioux Falls, S.D. Horob was one of four Beaver contenders to record a personal-best mark at the meet.
Just two weeks removed from breaking an eight-year-old record with a pole vault of 11-feet, 7.25-inches, Horob raised the bar to 11-07.75 at the championships to better her mark, but found herself on the outside looking in, finishing in ninth place.
Samatha Velde scored team points for BSU recording a personal-best 118-09 in the javelin to finish sixth. The mark surpassed her previous best mark by nearly 20 feet to jump in on the scoring, while Nicole Crummy, who was the strength of BSU's middle-distance events all season, recorded a personal-best two-minutes, 18.73 seconds in the 800-meter run preliminary race and on the heels of her first collegiate victory in the 5,000-meter run at the Cobber Twilight (April 28), Jolynne Denman clocked a personal-best 19:53.84 in the event, trimming more than 12 seconds for her best time to finish 25th.
The championships served as the final event for Craig Hougen as the head coach of the BSU track and field team. Hougen, who announced his retirement earlier this year, walked away from a program he has mentored for the last 26 years. During his tenure, BSU teams have produced two NSIC championships, five individual national champions, 30 All-Americans, six Academic All-America picks and nearly 400 all-conference performers. In addition, his teams and team members have been regularly honored for academic success by the United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches’ Association.

Concordia-St. Paul
Women’s team placed 12th at the NSIC Championships
Women’s Field: Esther Jandrich (Sr, Pole Vault) was All-Conference in pole vault where she is ranked 14th in the country.

University of Mary
For the fourth straight year the University of Mary dominated the second day of the Northern Sun women’s outdoor track & field championships to win the Marauders fourth straight conference crown. The Marauders scored 128 of their 162 points on the final day of the meet to easily outpace Augustana’s 109 points. The Marauders won eight total events and set two meet records. Kathryn Stewart, defending NSIC Women’s Track Athlete of the Year, won the 100 and 200 meter dashes and ran a leg on the winning 4x100 and 4x400 meter relay teams. Mary opened Day Two with a 4x100 victory behind the efforts of Stewart, Tonie Pandohie, Faith Kjelstrup and Cassandra Jones. In the final event of the day, Stewart joined with Josie Guptill, Rodriguez and Jones to set a 4x400 meet record (3:44.26). In addition to her two victories in the relay, Jones finished as a three-time winner for the Marauders when the sophomore won the 400 meter dash. Claiming two wins on the weekend was junior Danylle Kurywchak. She won the long jump on day one before shattering the conference record to win the triple jump with a leap of 12.61 meters (record was 12.17m). Kayla Cummings won the Marauders eighth title of the when the native of Helena, Mont., uncorked a throw of 39.45 meters to capture the event in surprise fashion. It was her first meet of the season for Mary and the best mark of the season by a thrower in the NSIC. Molly McDonald earned 22 points for the Marauders, placing second in the high jump, third in the multis, third in the 100 meter hurdles and sixth in the long jump. In the highly competitive pole vault, Davina Carr claimed second. The Marauders other runner-up finish was by Brienna Lynch in the 800 meter run. Additional Marauders all-conference performers are freshman Alexis Zeis in the 1,500 meter run and Crystal Hovland in the 400 meter hurdles, both of whom placed third.

Minnesota Duluth
Amelia Maher certainly made her final Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference Outdoor Track and Field Championship appearance a memorable one. The University of Minnesota Duluth senior finished as the NSIC leading point producer Saturday in Sioux Falls, S.D., and she and her Bulldog teammates wound up placing fourth among 14 league schools. Maher locked up the women’s high jump title (5’-05.75”) on Friday morning before going on to place second in the 400-meter hurdles (1:02.04) the following day. Maher, who finished as the runnerup in the league’s outdoor heptathlon competition last week (4,893 points), wrapped up the weekend by helping the 4 x 100 relay team take fifth and the 4 x 400 unit claim seventh. That gave the Sauke Center, Minn., product -- and recently-minted UMD  Top Female Scholar-Athlete for 2014-15 --  a personal harvest of 27.5 points. Besides Maher, UMD produced one other individual champion in freshman Emi Trost, whose NCAA Division II provisional-qualifying time of 4:27.39 took a backseat to no one in Saturday’s 1,500-meter run finals.

Minnesota State
The Minnesota State women’s track and field team finished fifth overall at the conference championships with 73 points.  Brieanna Puckett had a busy weekend guiding the 4x100 relay team (with Sid’Reshia Floyd, Mackenzie Beals and Karlona Gregory) to second with a time of 47.33.  She also finished third in the 100 and 200 meter events.  Anna Veroeven also placed twice taking third in the triple jump at 39’5.75 and eighth in the javelin.  

MSU Moorhead
The MSUM women finished in sixth at the NSIC Outdoor Track and Field Championships which concluded Saturday in Sioux Falls, S.D. Sophomore Alissa Mears won her first NSIC title of her career, taking the women’s 800-meter run title with a personal-best time of 2:10.89. She won the race by nearly three seconds.

Minot State
Kayla Lewis (Fr., Javelin, Pinesdale, Mont.) finished third in the women’s javelin.  The women’s 4x400 relay team of DelRay Audet (Jr., Hurdles, Minot, N.D.), Mary Roy (So., Sprints/Jumps, Mount Vernon, Ore.), Erica Clark (Sr., Mid-Distance, Gardena, Calif.) and Sienna Dailey (Sr., Sprints, Glasgow, Mont.) finished sixth overall with a 3:57.27. Roy had a huge PR in the triple jump to finish fifth with a leap of 38-feet-3¼. Dailey ended her fantastic career with a fifth and Audet raced to sixth in the 400 hurdles with a PR of 1:03.16. Lewis was the highest placewinner on the women’s side with her 38.62-meter toss in the javelin.
 
Northern State
The Wolves track and field squad ended their regular season in Sioux Falls on Saturday at the NSIC Outdoor Track and Field Championships.  A total of 14 women’s teams converged at the Lillibridge Track and Field complex hosted by the University of Sioux Falls, site of the 2018 NCAA DII Track and Field Championships. The lady Wolves tallied 43 points in route to an eighth place finish. Leading the Wolves on the women’s side were sophomore distance runners Sasha Hovind and Dakotah Bullen. The two finished second and fourth in both the 10,000m and 5,000m runs, earning a combined 26 team points between the two events.  

Southwest Minnesota State
Freshman Kim Shabino (Spencer, Iowa / Spencer HS) placed eighth in the 100 meters with a time of 12.30 and finished ninth in the 200 meters with a time of 25.36 at the NSIC Championships.

Sioux Falls
Kimberly Peterson picked up where she left off during the indoor season, winning her second straight NSIC women’s pole vault title in just her freshman season.
Katlyn Sawtelle had a big weekend for USF, earning places in the finals of two events after breaking a pair of USF records in the process. The 2015 NSIC Heptathlon Champion broke her own 100-meter hurdles and placed fourth in the event, as well as capped off the first day of competition with a school record time in the 200-meter dash.
The Cougars recorded eight top-three finishes at the meet to push their NSIC Outdoor All-Conference total to 37 in three years as a member of the league. USF’s four champions, Sawtelle’s NSIC Heptathlon title came two weeks prior to the meet, gives Sioux Falls a total of 13 conference champions.
Next up for the Cougars is the NCAA Championships on May 21-23 in Allendale, Mich. Peterson is guaranteed a spot in the women’s pole vault field after recording an automatic qualifying mark two weeks ago. Two more Cougars appear to rank high enough to earn a bid to the national meet with Sawtelle’s school-record heptathlon score ranking 11th in D2 this year and Megan Muller’s pole vault mark at the Howard Wood Relays holding at 15th. Eight Cougars recorded nine provisional or automatic qualifying marks this season.

St. Cloud State
The St. Cloud State women placed ninth at the 2015 NSIC/U.S. Bank Outdoor Track and Field Championships. The Huskies posted 37 points. Becky Schmidt (Sr., White Bear Lake, Minn.) captured second place in the long jump with a leap of 19-03.25. She was one of three Huskies to collect points in the event and improved her NCAA qualifying mark. She currently ranks 36th in the NCAA. Schmidt placed fourth in the 100 meters with a time of 12.09.
Patience Yalartai (So., Bloomington, Minn.) placed second in the triple jump with a mark of 40-06.00 and improved her NCAA qualifying mark, lifting her to 11th on the list. Yalartai also collected points in the long jump, placing fifth with a leap of 18-05.00.
Natalie Gottschalk (FY, Waukesha, Wis.) rounded out the Huskies scoring in the long jump as she placed seventh with a mark of 18-03.75. She also gathered points in the heptathlon and ranks 31st in NCAA qualifying.

Wayne State
   The Wayne State College women’s team finished seventh place with 63 points at the 2015 Northern Sun Conference Outdoor Track and Field Championships hosted by the University of Sioux Falls in Sioux Falls, South Dakota Friday and Saturday.
 The Wayne State women’s team had one conference champion with five All-NSIC performers, one new school record and six NCAA qualifying marks.
 The Wildcats took three of the top four spots Saturday in the shot put as senior Sara Wells won the event with a new NSIC meet and new school record throw of 54’ ½”.  She maintains the top throw in NCAA Division II in the shot put.
 Sophomore Michaela Denindger came in second place at 50’ 6 ¼”, good for All-NSIC honors along with an NCAA provisional mark.  Freshman Shandan Platt took fourth in the shot put with an NCAA provisional mark of 46’ 1 ½”.
 WSC women throwers recorded a pair of NCAA provisional marks Friday while placing 2nd-3rd-5th in the discus and 3rd-6th-7th in the hammer throw.
 Sophomore Michaela Dendinger earned All-NSIC honors with a second place finish in the discus at 162’ 1”, an NCAA provisional mark.  Senior Sara Wells was third in the discus (152’ 6”) and freshman Kacie O’Connor fifth at 151’ 11”.  Freshman Shandan Platt had an NCAA provisional mark in the hammer throw, receiving All-NSIC honors with a third place mark of 183’ 4”.  Wells was sixth in the event (174’ 1”) with Dendinger taking seventh at 173’ 2”.
 Junior Ellen Wulf had a strong fourth place finish in the long jump (18’ 6”) and was eighth in the heptathlon with 4,195 points while senior Megan Svitak was sixth in the heptathlon at 4,610 points and seventh in the 100 meter hurdles with a time of 14.83 seconds.

Winona State
The Winona State track and field team had a strong showing at the NSIC Outdoor Track and Field Championships, coming home with a third place finish with a score of 97 points.
Women’s Field:  Alissa Rausch had a stellar performance as she broke the NSIC Championship meet record in the discus with a 176’ 11” throw, topping former Warrior Mary Theisen’s previous record from 2011. Kaitlyn Long won the hammer throw with a career-best throw of 189’ 11”.
Women’s Track: Jordan Skelly won the 3000-meter steeplechase with a school-record time of 10:35.12, while Andrea Bartz broke her own school record in the triple jump with a leap of 39’ 3”.
The Warriors wait to find out who they will send to the NCAA Outdoor National Championships on June 21-23. Rausch is automatically qualified in the discus throw with the top mark in Division II. The Warriors have 17 provisional qualifying marks, 10 of which are in the top 25 of their respective events.

Women - Team Rankings - 21 Events Scored 
1) MARY 162
2) Augie 109
3) WSU 97
4) UMD 87
5) MSU 73
6) MSUM 72
7) WSC 63
8) NSU 44
9) SCSU 37
10) USF 35.50
11) MINOT 20
12) CU 14.50
13) BSU 3
14) SMSU 2