Briscoe, 4x400m relay win titles as No. 13 Women's Track & Field finishes second at Big 12 Championships
Feb. 24, 2013
AMES, Iowa – The No. 13 Texas Women’s Track & Field team scored in 17 of 19 events but fell just short of a Big 12 Indoor title, finishing second with 148 points. The Longhorns were led on Sunday by Shanay Briscoe (high jump) and the 4x400-meter relay team of Danielle Dowie, Briana Nelson, Kendra Chambers and Courtney Okolo, who both won titles on the second day of competition. Briscoe cleared 5-9.25 (1.76m) to claim her second indoor high jump championship and fourth in the event overall after placing fourth in the pentathlon on Saturday. Briscoe and senior Alicia Peterson combined for 12 team points in the event and each picked up All-Big 12 honors. Peterson placed seventh with a leap of 5-7.25/1.71m. The Texas 4x400m relay team also took home a Big 12 title, clocking a time of 3:33.54 first for UT’s first win in the event at the conference meet since 2005. The quartet continues to hold the top time in the nation, set at the Tyson Invitational earlier this month. Texas was tied for second with Iowa State at 138 points heading into the relay, 7 ½ points behind leader Kansas. The Jayhawks finished fourth in the final event, good for five points, landing UT just 2 ½ points out of first in the final tally. UT entered the day with 46 points and 15 competitors moving on to Sunday’s final rounds, in addition to Shanay Briscoe and A’Lexus Brannon in the high jump and triple jump, respectively. The Longhorns had three finalists in both the 400-meters and 200-meters, with freshman Courtney Okolo having qualified in both events. Okolo placed second in the 400m, clocking a season-best time of 52.72, followed closely by juniors Danielle Dowie (52.82) and Briana Nelson (53.02). In the 200-meter, junior Christy Udoh led the way for Texas in second with a personal-best time of 23.29. Senior Chalonda Goodman posted a new career-best mark in the event for the second straight race after PR’ing in Saturday’s prelims, finishing third in 23.34. Okolo crossed sixth in 24.05, and the trio earned 17 points for UT. Goodman and Udoh also competed in the 60-meter finals, where Goodman picked up third in a career-best 7.39. Udoh finished seventh, matching her season-best mark of 7.48. The Texas duo of junior Marielle Hall and sophomore Jessica Harper took on the Mile final. Hall, who ran the anchor leg of UT’s conference title-winning distance medley relay on Saturday, earned second with a season-best time of 4:47.59, the fastest Mile time for the Longhorns in 2013. Harper was eighth in 4:59.10. In the 3,000-meter, the Longhorns raced seven competitors with two upperclassmen finishing in the top-eight for all-conference honors out of a field of 35. Junior Sara Sutherland, who yesterday placed third in the 5,000-meter and led off UT’s first-place DMR, recorded a fourth-place finish in the 3,000 in 9:21.01, the Longhorns’ top mark in the event this season. She was joined on the podium by senior Mia Behm, who posted eighth in 9:31.22. Texas had two more third-place finishes, including Chambers in the 800-meter. Chambers, also a member of the Longhorns’ DMR, ran a 2:07.81, just half a second off her season-best in the event, for six team points. Sophomore Morgan Snow also finished third in the 60-meter hurdles, clocking a time of 8.27, one-hundredth of a second away from her personal-best, and combined with junior A’Lexus Brannon (seventh, 8.53) for eight points in the event. Also scoring for the Longhorns and earning All-Big 12 honors on Sunday were junior Katie Hoaldridge and freshman Melissa Gonzalez. Hoaldridge earned fourth place in the 1,000-meter in 2:49.47 after qualifying seventh out of Saturday’s prelim round. In the 600-yard run, Gonzalez picked up her first all-conference accolade with a seventh-place finish in 1:23.45. In total, Texas earned 34 All-Big 12 honors in 17 scored events on the weekend. Chambers, Nelson, Okolo and Sutherland led the way for the Longhorns with three each, while Brannon, Behm, Briscoe, Dowie, Goodman, Hall, Peterson and Udoh picked up two apiece. TEXAS RESULTS – SATURDAY, FEB. 24 High jump 4x400m relay 400m 200m Mile 800m 60m hurdles 60m 1,000m 3,000m 600y Triple jump
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