At their biggest home meet of the season Eastern’s women’s

track team was unable to take home the prize, but were good

enough to salvage a third-place finish at the Big Blue Classic

this weekend.

The Panthers, who were competing in their fourth meet in as

many weeks, had many strong performances by many of the members

of the team to place third.

“This team has given me a lot in the past four weeks,” women’s

head coach John Craft said. “I’m very pleased with how we have

performed, but I’m glad we have this upcoming weekend off to

get some rest, and then will get right back to work.”

One of Eastern’s top individual performers this weekend at the

Big Blue Classic was pole-vaulter Mary Wood.

Wood, who vaulted a personal best and a school record last

weekend at Purdue, was able to duplicate the feat by vaulting

10-feet 6-inches, which is another school record.

While the new school record is good, coach Craft knows that

Wood is looking to get a few more inches on her record.

“Well, 11-feet is a number that looms in women’s pole-

vaulting,” Craft said. “She is approaching the 11-feet mark,

and that is something that we have talked about this season,

and I know that that mark is one of her goals this season, and

with some more work shell get it this year.”

Another Panther that had a good weekend in the field events was

long triple jumper Marissa Bushue. Bushue took first in the

triple jump with a distance of 39-feet 6-inches, and second in

the long jump jumping 18-feet 2 and 1/4 inches.

Eastern also had some runners turn in great weekends starting

with distance runner Beth Martin, who was fourth in 3,000-meter

steeplechase, the first ever at O’Brien Stadium, and was fourth

in the 5,000-meter race with a time of 18:58.

“Beth’s performance was very encouraging because she has been

working very hard,” Craft said. “There is a lot to be said for

her running the steeplechase on Friday then coming back and

running the 5,000 on Saturday.”

Other runners that placed at the Big Blue Classic this weekend

were Lexie Nuckolls. Nuckolls, who was fourth in the 400-meters

and Katera Benson, who took second in the 200-meters with a

time 25.42 seconds.