Iowa City, IA - Ethan Poston brought home gold for the Cougars in the high jump at the Hawkeye Invitational.  He bested the field with a mark of 2.05m.  This jump beat the second place finisher by .05m.  Conor McCarthy's 6.92m long jump put him on the podium in third place. 

Another SIUE Cougar that made the podium at third place was Nick Matthews for his 18.85m weight throw.  SIUE crowded the weight throw finals with third, fourth, and fifth place performances.  Austin Lynch (18.46m) placed fourth, and John Barnes (18.27m) placed fifth.

 "I am happy with this weekend's performances...coming back from holiday break and training for just a week is not the easiest thing to do but the team stepped up," said head coach Scott Block.

 The women throwers were led by Alexis Hutchins with a sixth place weight throw of 16.26m and an eighth place shot put throw of 12.70m.  Jaylyn Scales led the women sprinters with a ninth place finish in the 600m with a time of 1:45.02. Keri Burmester topped the distance runners with an eighth place finish in the 3000m (10:40.02).

 "It is exciting to have the distance squad back after Christmas break.  We had some really spectacular performances.  Joseph Stone, Roland Prenzler and Keri Burmester each had performances that will put them at the top of the lists in the OVC," said assistant coach CeCe Moore. The track team was best finished by Joe Stone, who ran a 1:55.18 800m final, good for a third place finish.  Roland Prenzler led the distance runners with a 8:48.56 3000m fourth-place final run.  The 4x400 relay team took fifth place with a time of 3:27.38.