McGuigan, Rebels Get Hot Start at SEC Outdoors

Ole Miss athletes got off to a strong start on the first day of the Southeastern Conference Outdoor Track & Field Championships on Friday, including a school record and several runners advancing through the prelims to qualify for SEC finals.

“Today was a good day of qualifying,” Rebel head coach Brian O’Neal said. “We had some scoring opportunities and we put ourselves in a good position to compete and battle moving forward.”

Dempsey McGuigan Photo courtesy of Josh McCoy/ Ole Miss Athletics

and Nathan Loe got Ole Miss on the board in a big way to start the championships in the men’s hammer throw. McGuigan, a redshirt-freshman from London, U.K., placed runner-up with a personal-best and school-record toss of 219-6. He actually broke his own school record twice during Friday’s competition and became the Rebels’ best ever finisher in the SEC hammer throw. His mark will rank him among the top 20 nationally heading into the NCAA East Preliminary in a couple of weeks.

Loe, a junior from Acworth, Georgia, also had a personal best of 210-10 that ranks No. 2 in school history and earned him seventh place for the second year in a row.

The hammer throw duo scored 10 big points for the Rebel men.

Sophomore Jalen Miller made sure he advanced to Saturday’s 200-meter final by winning his heat and automatically qualifying for the final with a season-best time of 20.86. He is also expected to run the 100 meters and 4×100-meter relay over the next two days.

Junior Holland Sherrer ran a personal-best 1:47.47 to advance to Saturday’s 800-meter final with the sixth-fastest time in the prelims. He moves up to No. 4 in school history and makes the SEC final for the second straight season (placed seventh last year).

After the first half of the decathlon, sophomore Peyton Moss sits in 15th place with a score of 3,299 points. He has a good chance of moving up Friday with his best event, the pole vault, among the final five of the competition.

The women also had a solid day, including three Rebels who put themselves in position to score team points later in the meet.

Brooke Feldmeier, the SEC Women’s Indoor Freshman Runner of the Year, kept her winning ways alive by finishing first in her heat (2:06.88) to automatically qualify for Saturday’s 800-meter final. She is the top-ranked freshman nationally in the 800 and currently ranks 12th overall.

Senior Fabia McDonald and freshman Brittany Kelly are seventh and eighth place, respectively, after the first day of the women’s heptathlon. McDonald’s score of 3,376 includes a personal-best 5-8 in the high jump (No. 8 in school history) and season-best 14.04 in the 100-meter hurdles. Kelly’s score of 3,367 includes a personal-best 13.70 in the 100-meter hurdles (No. 5 in school history), a personal-best 5-9.25 in the high jump (No. 6 in school history) and a personal-best 24.61 in the 200 meters.

Friday’s events begin at 10 a.m. with the decathlon and run through 6:45 p.m.

Courtesy of Ole Miss Sports Information