Central Michigan Life

Issue date: 2/27/08 Section: Sports

Freshman distance Danielle Dakroub and the women's track and field team travel to Ypsilanti on Friday for the two-day Mid-American Conference Championships. The Chippewas placed fourth last season. [Click to enlarge]

One meet will define the women's track and field team's season after six months of training and eight weeks of competition.

Central competes in the Mid-American Conference Indoor Championships at Bob Parks Tracks on Friday and Saturday in Ypsilanti.

Coach Karen Lutzke said every athlete must be at her best.

"Everyone has to come together on the same day," she said. "It's got to be one event after another where we're doing what we need to do and we have some surprises. And surprises will mean people making some big improvements."

The Chippewas finished fourth out of 12 teams last season in Akron, but have lost more than half of the team's scorers to graduation and are looking for others to contribute.

"We lost some big point scorers with Mary Raney, Najah Floyd, Jackie Smart, Tomea Peebles," Lutzke said. "Those ladies scored a lot of points. We can make those points up between a lot of different people."

However, senior sprinter Jenaie Edwards also had success. Edwards won the 400-meter dash, placed second as part of the 1,600m relay team, and fifth as part of the distance medley team. This season, Edwards holds the second-fastest times in the 400m dash and the 800m.

Edwards said she wants to repeat her win in the 400m.

"It's been weighing on my mind heavily," she said. "I would really love to get the repeat. I see everything positive in my training and weight lifting and the times I've been running."

The team has seen a collective improvement in performances the past few weeks. Last weekend's Jack Skoog Open saw senior Tempestt Stanford tie her season best in the 60m dash, while freshman Jordan Dunn and sophomore Cara Dukes set personal records. Freshman Danielle Dakroub also set a personal best when she won the 1,600m run.

"Last week was sort of another week of just working on getting sharp and working on staying healthy," Lutzke said.

CMU's throwers also have improved. Junior Michaela Danhoff, sophomore Whitney Johnson and freshmen Norianna Brown and Mykal Imbrock all set season-bests in February.

Larry Levine, an assistant coach that works primarily with the throwers, said the team should be competitive with the rest of the conference.

"We've got people on the list that on paper should be scoring," Levine said. "I'm thinking that they'll still be able to move above those marks and move up even higher in the ranks."

But with all the personal records of late and the vast improvement of the team, Lutzke said it will come down to if the team can on its game this weekend.

"We're counting on every single body we have out there to do their part, to contribute at the MAC meet," she said.



sports@cm-life.com

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