Florida lived up to coach Mike Holloway’s lofty standards on the first day of the 38th Annual Frank Sevigne Husker Invitational in Lincoln, Neb.
With the field events up for grabs, the Gators placed in all four events they competed in. In the weight throw, sophomore Jayla Bostic placed second for the women and senior Jeremy Postin came in third for the men.
The long jump proved to be an even bigger success for Florida. Junior Lorraine Graham and sophomore Ciarra Brewer finished second and third, respectively, for the women while sophomore Marquis Dendy and senior Omar Craddock also finished second and third, respectively.
“I was pleased with the way we performed today, across the board,” Holloway said. “Half of our athletes qualified for finals tomorrow, and I think our throwers and jumpers are where they should be at this point in the season.”
Florida had nine athletes qualify for Saturday’s finals. From the preliminaries, four Gators achieved personal bests at the Devaney Center. For the men, sophomore sprinter Dedric Dukes clocked 21.18 seconds in the men’s 200m and freshman hurdler Moriel Pitt (7.98 sec) also PR’d in the men’s 60m hurdles.
“Moriel had a great race today and tied his PR to advance to tomorrow’s final,” Holloway said. “I was proud of him for that.”
Freshmen sprinters Destinee Gause (7.37 sec) and Kyra Jefferson (7.42 sec) each had personal bests in the women’s 60m dash.
“I was very impressed with Destinee and Kyra, who both ran PRs in the 60 today,” Holloway said. “They’re progressing well as the season continues and keep working hard in practice which shows at meets.”
Florida’s youth continues to flourish, as six of the nine aforementioned qualifiers are underclassmen, including sophomore sprinter Hugh Graham, Jr. and freshman sprinter Arman Hall.
“I’m very proud of both Hugh and Arman for qualifying for finals tomorrow,” Holloway said. “An important part about this meet is being able to prepare for the conference meet. You have to run prelims and finals on back-to-back days and I think they both had solid runs today and understand what it takes to prepare for that many races in such a short span of time.”
Heading into Saturday, the Gators are primed for another stellar performance and looking to sustain the momentum they’ve been able to carry so far this season.
“I think everyone has an understanding of what we want to get done this weekend,” Holloway said. “We’re going to rest up for tomorrow, go back to the track, stick our nose in there and see what we can do.”
