Feb. 1, 2006
Columbia, SC – Turning it up a few notches, the South Carolina track and field teams will travel to New York City Fri.-Sat., Feb. 3-4 to compete in the New Balance Collegiate Invitational at the Armory. Those competing in the 60m and 60m hurdles will be competing for finals berths to be run at the 99th Millrose Games in the evening on Friday, Feb. 3. The Millrose Games, considered the crown jewel of the indoor track and field circuit, will be broadcast from 6:30-8:30 p.m. on Sunday, Feb. 5 on ESPN2.
The Carolina women were ranked No. 1 in the latest trackwire.com poll, while the men climbed to No. 15.
The Armory meet includes teams from across the country, including Texas, Stanford, Baylor, Alabama, Tennessee, LSU, Cal-Berkley, Illinois and a number of Big East schools
“This meet is part of the progression from the regular season to a championship season,” said USC head coach Curtis Frye, in his 10th season at Carolina. “At the forefront there is the NCAA Championship, then the SEC Championship and then the larger, more competitive meets on a national scale and this is one. The meets we have competed in so far, while very competitive, were more regional-type meets. The Armory meet and the Tyson Invitational (Feb. 10-11) are the national meets on our indoor schedule this year.”
The meet will also give a few Gamecocks a chance to be exposed to the professional athletes that will be competing at Millrose Games in nearby Manhattan.
The Millrose Games will run a high school race, a collegiate race and then the Millrose sprint championships in the 60m and 60m hurdles. The high school and collegiate athletes will be running on the track prior to the world’s best athletes.
Competing in the Armory in preliminaries on Friday afternoon, those athletes who advance to the finals of the 60m and 60m hurdles will run later that evening in Madison Square Garden at the 99th Millrose Games.
“They are the opening act for the main attractions in the 60m and 60m hurdles,” said Frye. “There is a number of Olympic medalists will be running in the 60m and 60m hurdles.”
One female working to advance to MSG is Greenville’s Amberly Nesbitt. The Gamecock sophomore has run the NCAA leader in the 60m (7.25) this season. Nesbitt’s time is also the third fastest time run by an American this year.
On the men’s side USC will look to advance Leroy Dixon and OJ Murdock to the finals at the Millrose Games. Murdock, a redshirt-freshman on the football team, was the Florida state champion in the 100m and 200m his senior year of high school.
One professional familiar to Gamecocks and running the women’s 60m is USC alum Lisa Barber, the 2005 100m USA champion who placed fifth at the 2005 World Championships. She later won a gold medal as part of the USA’s 4x100m relay at the World Championships. Barber has run the world-leader at 7.09 this season.
The adidas women’s 60-meter dash features one of the strongest Millrose fields in history. World Outdoor 100m gold medalist and Olympic silver medalist Lauryn Williams lands at MSG in search of her first win. But she was upset last week by Barber, who enters the meet atop of Visa Championship Series point standings. Neither woman can overlook Olympic 200m gold medalist Veronica Campbell of Jamaica, 2004 NCAA 60m champion Muna Lee, 2005 Visa Champion Angela Daigle-Bowen, two-time World Indoor silver medalist Angela Williams, or 2000 Olympic 4x100m relay gold medalist Debbie Ferguson of the Bahamas, who trains with Lauryn Williams.
Five-time NCAA champion and USC alum Terrence Trammell will run with the big leaguers in the 60m and 60m hurdles. Trammell will attempt to win the 60m hurdles in addition to competing in the dash, a feat that no one has accomplished in the history of the Millrose Games (winning both races). The 2001 Millrose 60m hurdles champion, Trammell barely missed the double in 2003 when he won the 60m dash but was second in the hurdles. The hurdles field in 2006 includes 2005 U.S. outdoor runner-up Dominique Arnold, 2005 USA indoor champion Joel Brown, Arend Watkins and Antwon Hicks.
Both Barber and Trammell won their signature event last weekend in Boston. Both train out of Columbia these days.
“We also have a number of collegiate athletes who will compete near their hometowns including Natasha Hastings and Ronnetta Alexander,” said Frye. “It will be Adrian Durant and Chelsea Hammond’s last meet as a collegiate in New York City.”
USC will also compete in the women’s 4x400m relay at the Millrose Games on Friday evening.
“The New York Armory meet has provided us exposure we haven’t been able to get elsewhere,” said Frye. “We are excited to take them home to a place where the high school indoor national championships are run. There are track supporters in the Northeast that would pick a track meet over eating – they appreciate track to the highest point. It might be the indoor track capital of the US and the Armory is the epee-center this weekend. There’s so much history there.
“This meet is our first chance to prove ourselves nationally,” continued Frye. “A lot of our ranking right now is just projection. This will take it to another level this weekend. We will be facing some of the top athletes in the country. Three of the top five NCAA sprinters will be there on the women’s side and on the men’s side probably five of the finalists will also be competing at the Armory. It’s going to be a great weekend in New York City.”
And the Gamecocks, current and former, can’t wait to get there!
