Feb. 5, 2016

Photo Gallery

NEW YORK, N.Y. – The South Carolina track and field program showed up in a big way Friday, opening the Armory Track Invitational with strong performances across all disciplines. All told, four new program top-10 marks were recorded and ten Gamecocks scored for the team.

The day started with a pair of qualifying rounds in both the 60m and 60m hurdles. The men went a perfect 9-for-9 in moving out of the preliminary rounds of the two events, and the women sent all but one of their 11 entries between the two on to the semifinals.

In the women’s semifinal rounds, Gabby Gray would pull out a new career-best time to earn her way into the finals of the 60 dash. She ran a 7.53, the best time of the season for any Gamecock, and qualified seventh overall for tomorrow afternoon’s finale.

In the men’s sprints, three made the semifinals of the 60 dash, and David Winters punched his ticket to the finale as the event’s top qualifier at 6.70 seconds. In the high hurdles, Carolina proved it has one of the deepest talent pool in the country with a solid semifinal. The Gamecocks went 2-3-5 in the semis, with Dondre Echols leading the way with a new season-best time of 7.73 seconds. He’ll be joined in the final tomorrow by Isaiah Moore and Jermaine Collier.

There would be plenty of finals on Friday to keep the adrenaline pumping. Drew Trusty provided the team’s first points of the weekend from the track, coming in the 5000m. He would shave over 20 seconds off his previous season best, finishing seventh overall with a time of 14:43.24. That moved him all the way up to fifth in program history, and it was the second-fastest 5K by a Gamecock since the year Trusty was born (1992).

Wrapping up the day one men’s track scorers were Otis Jones and Jussi Kanervo in the 500m. Jones would score big with a second-place finish, and Kanervo came in fifth.

In the field events, three other men scored for Carolina. Josh Awotunde led the way with a second-place finish in the men’s shot put with a top throw of 60 feet, three inches. Richard Fish placed fourth in the pole vault, and Michael Wamer scored with a seventh-place finish in the long jump and a new personal best. His mark of 7.23 meters also moved him into the program’s top 10, giving this current team three of the top 10 individual marks in history.

For the women, it would not be just Gabby Gray who had a positive result on the track. The trio of Aliyah Abrams, Briana Haith and Erika Rucker wowed with a dominant performance in the 400m. Rucker led the way with a second-place finish in 53.09, Abrams came second at 53.62 and Haith rounded it out by crossing sixth. Rucker’s time puts her comfortably in the top 10 nationally, based on times entering the weekend. Also in the running events, freshman Allie Mueller posted the fifth-fastest 1000m time in program history, running in 2:58.85.

Capping off the day one scorers, Carolina scored in both women’s field events. Nakita Gray was the top collegiate finisher in the high jump invitational, hitting five feet, 11 ¼ inches. In the long jump, Natasha Dicks hit a new personal best and took third overall. Her top mark of 19 feet, 8 ¼ inches also put her ninth in program history, giving her top 10 marks in both horizontal jumps so far in her career.

The meet wraps up tomorrow with another day packed full of events. The women kick things off right at 9 a.m. with the 3000m and high jump. The men get going at 9:45 in the triple jump and on the track at 11:30 with the preliminary rounds of the 200m.