Women take conference title

For the second year in a row, the IU women's team are the Big Ten champs.\nThe team earned the title this weekend at the Big Ten Outdoor Track & Field Championship at IU's Billy Hayes Track. Stong performances put the Hoosiers on top with a final score of 140, followed by Purdue with 122.5 and Minnesota with 99.25.\nThe weekend was complete after senior Lorraine Dunlop, junior Danielle Carruthers, sophomore Rachelle Boone and junior Tia Trent finished second place in the 4x400m with a time of 3:39.53. \n"It's the best feeling in the world," Dunlop said. "That's what keeps us trying to win every year and it kept us trying to keep going in this meet even when we were tired. That's all we worked for, to be champions."\nIndividually, the women also contributed to the team's victory. Boone brought in two first place finishes in the 100-meter and 200-meter dash. Carruthers placed second in the 100-meter, third in the 200-meter, and eighth in the 100-meter hurdles. Dunlop placed fifth in both the 100-meter and 200-meter. Trent added a third place finish in the 400-meter and seventh in the 200-meter.\nBoone, Carruthers and Dunlop were also joined by sophomore Rose Richmond to achieve a 44.01 first place finish in the 4x100-meter relay. Richmond also jumped to a first place finish with 6.31 meters in the long jump event.\nSenior Courtney Bell completed the 800-meter in 2:10.03, a strong finish she was not expecting and a fourth place victory for IU.\n"I made it in by the skin of my teeth again," Bell said. "I got kind of scared in the beginning, but then I just went."\nOther long distance points were earned by junior Stephanie Magley who placed fourth in the 1,500-meter, followed by sophomore Lauren Weddell who placed sixth.\nTeam members said day-to-day victories in both preliminary and final events motivated the team to keep doing better. Senior Jennifer Brown placed first in shot put with a throw of 15.7 meters after she watched Carruthers achieve a personal record and finish first in the 100-meter preliminary run.\n"As a group, it's contagious," Boone said. "To see everyone do so well makes you want to do well because you don't want to be the let down point."\nIU further excelled in field events. Sophomore Irina Kharun mastered 52.08 meters in the javelin throw and junior Heather Colyer 50.08 meters in the discuss throw. An unanticipated second place 12.39 meter finish in the triple jump came from senior Maria Fleischmann after she had been suffering since January from a back injury.\n"It feels good that I was able to jump for the team. I've been jumping pretty bad all year," Fleischmann said. "I was ready, I was ready to go out and win this meet. I'm pretty satisfied, because it's been a hard year for me."\nBig smiles were seen and loud cheers were heard throughout the Robert C. Haugh tack and field complex when the IU women's team was announced champions. Team members held their IU flag and took a victory lap.\n"This is our home," Boone added. "We showed up and we want to win it all. The girls knew, it's their home track."\n"A bunch of them said last night, nobody else is going to take a victory lap around our track and it pretty much says it all right there," coach Randy Heisler said. "We're really excited. We've got nine girls going to nationals in a week. They've done a great job and we just hope with our recruiting class coming in that we can keep going"