The Winona State Indoor Track and Field team competed against the Minnesota State-Mankato Mavericks in the Mark Schuck Dual on Saturday, Jan. 30.

This is the Warriors’ first time competing in a two-team formatted meet this season.

Although Winona State fell short against the Mavericks, only netting 57 points to their 94 in the events, the Warriors took some of the top marks in the outing.

Coming off a 4×400 relay victory at the Craig Houten Triangular season opener the past week, fourth-year Kalley Harris, third-year Kendall Zeman, third-year Shereen Vallabouy and third-year Brooklyn Schyvinck are eyeing an NCAA Nationals Championship return this season.

Harris said a return to the championship would be great after last year’s events were cancelled due to COVID-19.

“As a senior, I would love for our 4×4 team to make it to nationals for another year,” Harris said. “With the cancellation of the NCAA National Championships last season, we all took not getting to compete pretty hard.”

The relay team with third-year Maddy Pietz, Schyvinck, Zeman and Harris “doubled downed” on their nationals vision with a first-place finish with a time of 3:51:51.

Harris said she is excited for the team to progress, taking it meet by meet.

“I am excited to see everyone grow in their abilities of their specific event,” Harris said. “We have a lot of talent on the team already, so it will be exciting to see how this year’s conference meet will go once we get some more meets under our belt.”

In the jumping events, third-year Madison Rizner tied the Winona State high jump record mark with a 1.68-meter jump and won the event on Saturday.

Rizner’s high jump mark equaled Hillary Cunningham’s record, earned in 2005.

Second-year Kaylee Olson was second with a 1.65-meter attempt in high jump.

Third-year Xana Leum took second in the triple jump with a mark of 11.07 meters and third-year Ashlie Lockington earned third at 11.02 meters.

In the 5000-meter run, Winona State rolled in with the top three times with first-year McKenna Taylor, third-year Alli Hedrickson and fourth-year Katie Lorenz finishing first, second and third for the Warriors.

Taylor’s time was 18:41.40, just ahead of Hendrickson at 18:43.82 and Lorenz set a 19:56.35 time in the complete sweep for Winona State.

In the 1000-meter run, the Warriors performed well with second-year Kaylee Beyer taking first place with a time of 3:03.47.

First-year Linsday Cunningham earned second at 3:05.07 and second-year Andrea Fromelt took fourth with a time of 3:23.87 in the race.

Leum took second for Winona State in the 60-meter hurdles and third-year Michaela Pryor was also second in the 60-meter dash. In the 200-meter race, Pryor also captured second place.

Harris and first-year Lainey Lipschultz were second and fifth in the women’s 400-meter race.

Despite falling to the Mavericks in overall points in the outing, Harris said the Warriors track and field team is driven and determined to change the results in the future meets.

“I am so proud of the team for committing their time and effort into doing the drills and workouts on their own last spring and part of this fall, even when we were not able to practice together,” Harris said. “I think that shows a lot about the team’s character as a whole and love for the sport.”