Feb. 28, 2009
USAF ACADEMY, Colo. - San Diego State seniors Decontee Kaye and Karoline Koehler dominated the triple jump, taking the top two spots, on the final day of the Mountain West Conference Indoor Track and Field Championships at the United States Air Force Academy.
Kaye, who now enters the outdoor season as the two-time defending MWC triple jump champ, won the indoor version of the triple jump with a personal-record leap of 43 feet, 8.50 inches. Her performance is the second-best in school history, ranks fourth in NCAA Division I (according to TrackShark.com) and automatically qualifies her for the NCAA Indoor Championships.
Koehler, who won the long jump on Friday, finished in second place in the triple jump after covering 43-2.50. Her effort was an NCAA Championships provisional qualifying mark even though she already secured a spot at nationals with her triple jump at the New Mexico Classic earlier this month. The senior also came in third place in the 60-meter dash with a time of 7.43 and logged an eighth-place finish in the 200 after crossing the finish line in 25.07.
Other solid efforts in the triple jump came from freshman Thoraya Maronsey and senior Shana Watson. Maronsey, from nearby La Mesa, Calif., posted a 10th-place finish with her personal-record leap of 37-8.75. That distance was good enough for ninth place on SDSU's all-time indoor performance list. Watson, meanwhile, capped a busy meet with an 11th-place, season-best jump of 37-5.00.
In the finals of the 60-meter hurdles, freshman Annimari Korte owned the sixth-fastest time of the day, 8.75, while sophomore Briana Johnson clocked in at 8.78, which was good for seventh place.
In the high jump, freshman Sheehan Mitchell scored for the Aztecs with her eighth-place and personal-record clearance of 5-5.00. Mitchell, who also competed with Watson in the pentathlon, made her debut in the school's all-time record book with the program's sixth-best leap ever.
Senior Kristin Glen, meanwhile, navigated the 3,000-meter run in season-best fashion and clocked in with a time of 11:25.46. Junior Leanne Taylor followed suit in the shot put with her 2009-best toss of 40-5.00.
As a team, San Diego State moved up two spots from the day before and finished in sixth place with 46 points. The Aztecs finished behind BYU (224 points), TCU (117), Colorado State (61), Utah (59) and New Mexico (53) and ahead of Air Force (40), UNLV (36) and Wyoming (26).
Next week, SDSU will travel to UC San Diego for the San Diego City Championship on Saturday, March 7.