Head-to-head matchups crucial to Irish victory
By ANDREW SOUKUP
Sports Writer
Sure, Notre Dame sprinter Tameisha King has a ton of talent.
But so far this season, the sophomore All-American has yet to compete against someone as good as Michigan State's Sherita Williams.
When the Spartans enter the Loftus Sports Complex today to take on the Irish, King and the rest of the Irish will face an early-season test to show how well they can compete against high level competition.
At last week's triangular meet against Western Michigan and Ball State, King cruised to wins in the 60 meter dash, the 60 meter hurdles and the long jump. Her closest competition came from teammate Kristen Dodd, who was only three-hundreths of a second behind King in he 60 meter dash.
But Williams also had a strong showing last week. At the six-team Red Simmons Invitational, the sophomore collected a pair of wins in the long jump and triple jump and added a third place finish in the 60 meter dash.
The two athletes have comparable performances this season. King, who will be competing against Williams in the 60 meter hurdles and the long jump, sprinted 8.63 in the hurdles and jumped 19 feet, 4 1/4 inches. By comparison, Williams covered the 60 meter hurdles in 8.95 seconds and long jumped 19-1/2.
"She will provide a good challenge," said Irish head coach Joe Piane. "I'd like to think that on her best day Tameisha is a little better."
Williams is also competing in the triple jump, where the Irish are counting on school record holder Jamie Volkmer to beat the Spartans' top athlete. Williams jumped 40-8 1/4 last week, as compared to Volkmer's 39-10 3/4 effort.
Volkmer is also entered in the pole vault for the first time since junior Natalie Hallett and freshman Jill VanWeelden broke Volkmer's school record in the pole vault last week. Volkmer, Hallet, VanWeelden and Bethany Wilson are all entered in tomorrow's competition.
Junior Liz Grow, fresh off her NCAA provisional qualifying performance in the 400 meter dash last week, will be running the 60 meter dash and the 200 meter dash.
"We're trying to work on her speed a little bit this week," said Irish sprints coach John Millar. "She's already provisionally qualified in the 400 meters, so we're trying to qualify her in other events this week."
Competing alongside Grow in the 200 meter dash are freshman Kristen Dodd and Ayesha Boyd. Both freshmen are coming off strong performances last week — Dodd took second in the 60 meter dash and third in the 200 meter dash and Boyd took fifth in the 400 meter dash.
In order to beat the Spartans, Irish coaches feel they need to focus on getting points in the field events and sprints in order to beat the Spartans. According to Irish coach Joe Piane, Michigan State has an extremely deep and talented distance crew.
The Irish are hoping for strong performances from Leanne Brady in the 800 meters and Megan Johnson and Chrissy Kuenster in the mile. Kuenster and Jennifer Handley are expected to be competive with Spartan runners in the 3,000 meter run.
"Michigan State has a very strong distance group," said Irish head coach Joe Piane. "We're going to try to break even there."
The meet begins at 6 p.m.
All Sports Stories for Friday, January 26, 2001
