Tulane University
NCAA East Regional
Ruzevic Advances to NCAA National Championships
May 27, 2011 | Track & Field
May 27, 2011
BLOOMINGTON, Ind. - It was Ana Ruzevic's day on Friday at the Robert C. Haugh Track and Field Complex on the campus of Indiana University and the junior made the most of it during her competition at the NCAA East Regional. In just her fourth competition of the season, Ruzevic secured her second straight trip to the NCAA National meet by placing third overall with a toss of over 48 meters.
"Ana entered the meet with high hopes and now has an opportunity to improve upon her ninth place finish from the national meet last season," said Tulane head coach Eric Peterson. "She now has an opportunity to score in the national meet, which is something that would be a great thing for her and our program. She also has a chance to earn All-American honors and she competed very well today. She was very consistent today and really competed well in each round. In round three, she threw over 48-meters, which put her into second place going into the finals. She ended up third, after he back tightened up during the long layoff between the prelims and the finals."
Ruzevic claimed her second trip to the NCAA National Championships with her third throw of the competition and entered the final ranked second in the East. The Split, Croatia eventually finished third to a pair of competitors from Penn State with her third best throw of the season at 48.62-meters. It was only the fourth meet of the season for the junior, who set the school record in her first competition of the year by launching the javelin 51.37-meters at the Tulane Team Challenge. It is the first time this season that Ruzevic didn't win the event, as she took the individual titles at the Tulane Team Challenge, the LSU Relays and the Conference USA Championships.
"Ana is a great competitor," said Peterson. "I am really proud of how she competed today and this is step number one towards her ultimate goal. The Conference USA championship was a huge breakthrough for her, personally, being the champion. She followed that up with a qualification for the national championships meet and now looks forward to competing against the best javelin throwers in nation. She will challenge herself to being as good as she can be."
Ruzevic becomes just the third Tulane student-athlete to advance to the NCAA Championships in back-to-back seasons. The last Green Wave to accomplish the feat was Gloria Asumnu, who went to four straight NCAA National Meets from 2005-08, while Jelena Jurlina went to back-to-back national meets as a javelin thrower in 2003-04. Hanne Lyngstad advanced to three straight national competitions from 1998-2000.
"We are looking to finish the meet strong tomorrow in the 4x100-meter relay," said Peterson. "We want to finish up the meet as strong as we can tomorrow afternoon."
Tiffany George was disqualified during the 200-meter dash with a false start, but will have one more chance to compete on Saturday as a member of the 4x100-meter dash.
The Green Wave's relay squad will complete their stay at the NCAA East Regional when the 4x100-meter relay squad takes to the lanes at 5:00 p.m. Central time.
--TulaneGreenWave.com--
Players Mentioned
