With the Conference USA indoor track championships just a week away, Marquette head coach Dave Uhrich was not the least bit concerned that his Golden Eagles lost to Wisconsin-Milwaukee on both the men's and women's side Friday at the Panther Tune Up.
Just as an NFL coach would rest his star quarterback the week before the playoffs, Uhrich lessened the workload of some of his key athletes who are prime candidates to place at the C-USA championship meet next weekend in Houston.
"If we really wanted to, we could have put people in certain events and done things a certain way to try and win, but that wasn't our focus," Uhrich said. "We just wanted to get people ready to run this weekend."
Despite Uhrich's reservations, the best Golden Eagle athletes still performed well Friday.
Senior sprinter Crystal Andalcio-O'Neil continued her attack on the tough competition in C-USA with two sterling performances. She won the 60-meter dash in a time of 7.58 seconds and captured the 200-meter crown with a time of 25.10, twice beating UWM's Timeka Walker to the finish line.
Junior Jon Shaffer won the men's 400-meter run with a time of 48.84. Shaffer, who normally runs the 800 meters and a leg of the distance medley, was part of Uhrich's plan of having distance runners compete in shorter events to keep them fresh for Houston.
Freshman Cassie Peller also ran a shorter event than usual. Normally a miler, Peller clocked in at 2:15.50 to win the women's 800-meter run.
"That worked out really well," Uhrich said. "People have come a long way technically-speaking and the people who ran shorter events looked really sharp."
Freshman Ray Bratchett leapt 6 feet 10 inches to snare the high jump title, a jump that placed him almost a full foot ahead of his closest competitor.
"Seven feet is a barrier in track, and if you're high jumping seven feet or over, that's very impressive," Uhrich said. "Ray made 6-10 and then had a couple of good attempts at seven feet. It was a huge step forward for him."
Jonathon Rosploch continued his banner senior campaign by taking first place in the shot put and the weight throw.
Rosploch flung the shot put 16.91 meters and the weight 17.66 meters to win both events.
"Jonathon just exploded this weekend with two huge personal best throws," Uhrich said. "He's really looking to end his senior year with a bang."
In other action, senior Ryan Seebruck won the men's 200-meter dash with a time of 22.63.
Senior Lucky Denega won the women's 60-meter hurdles with a time of 8.96.
Heather Thomason and Jessica Ehlen finished first and second, respectively, in the women's shot put, while Andrea Englemann and Jenna Mahaffey went 1-2 in the women's weight throw.
This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Feb. 22 2005.