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Marquette Wire

The student news site of Marquette University

Marquette Wire

The student news site of Marquette University

Marquette Wire

Marquette disappoints in outdoor Championships

The Marquette women’s track and field team finished 14th out of 16 teams while the men finished 12th out of 14 at the Big East Outdoor Championships over the weekend in Cincinnati.

The women finished 89 points behind first-place Louisville while the men finished 110 points behind first-place Notre Dame.

Coach Bert Rogers said the scores weren’t what the teams hoped for, but he said there were still solid performances scattered throughout the meet.

One of those performances was by junior Peter Bolgert, who ran the second best 3000-meter steeplechase in Marquette history (8:54.76) and finished in fourth place. He was a little over a second off of breaking the school’s current record (8:53.29).

“I wasn’t thinking much about times during the race, but I was trying to run for a good finishing place,” Bolgert said. “I didn’t find out my time until a little bit afterward and I thought, ‘Oh, that’s fast.’ ”

Bolgert came 1.47 seconds short of tying the school mark but his time didn’t frustrate him much.

“I can go for the school record again at regioinals,” Bolgert said. “I still (set a personal record) by about seven seconds, so I’m not complaining about that. I’m pretty confident that I can (break the record).”

Redshirt senior Jeff Kluge finished fifth in the hammer throw (185 feet, 4 inches) and fifth in the discus (168 feet, 11 inches). He was seeded seventh in the hammer and eighth in the discus going into the meet.

Kluge was very happy with his performance. Not only did he finish higher than he was seeded, but he had the best Big East performance of his career.

Kluge’s impressive performance in the hammer came despite poor weather, as it was raining and muddy during the competition. He said the poor weather was nothing he couldn’t handle.

“We’ve had a lot of bad weather over the past few years that we’ve practiced in, so it’s nothing new,” Kluge said. “Weather really isn’t a huge concern to me, but it is to some people.”

This was the best Kluge ever placed at the Big East, and it was during a season in which he was more consistent in both the hammer and the discus than any other year of his career. He said he definitely left the Big East on a high note, and Rogers agreed.

“Any time you’re throwing at your best, that’s where you want to be,” Rogers said. “Jeff’s a guy who’s really improved throughout his career.

“If we had a whole lot of Jeff Kluge’s on our team we’d be pretty good.”

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