Jessica Lee Crowned New England Champion in the 60m Hurdles to Highlight QU Women’s Indoor Track & Field

Saturday, February 27

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New England Championships

Jessica Lee Crowned New England Champion in the 60m Hurdles to Highlight QU Women’s Indoor Track & Field

2/28/2016 12:55:00 AM | Women's Indoor Track & Field

Lee Becomes the First Hurdler to Win Gold Medal at New England Championships in Program History

By: QU Sports Information

BOSTON, Massachusetts – What already was a good weekend got immensely better for Jessica Lee (Montgomery, New Jersey) as the sophomore hurdler for the Quinnipiac women's indoor track and field team made history with her gold medal performance at the New England Championships. As a team, Quinnipiac managed to compile 20 points over the weekend which was good enough for 12^th place out of 32 teams.

Having already advanced to the semifinal to the next stage of the 60m hurdles and 200m dash on Friday, Lee rested up for what was to be a busy day on Saturday. She continued to excel as in the semifinal round of the 60m hurdles she timed in at 8.78 seconds which was the second-fastest time in the respective round. Her history-making performance came in the finals as she was locked in a tight three-way battle for first as the three were only separated by less than 1.2 seconds. In the end, Lee was victorious as she clocked in with a program record 8.61 seconds to leg out two runners from Northeastern (Betsy Garnick – 8.612; Nicole Genard – 8.619) to become the first hurdler in program history to be crowned a New England Champion.

Lee's incredible weekend continued as she prepared for the finals of the 200m dash. After not racing in the 200m at last year's New England Championships, Lee made quite the impression this weekend as she placed fifth in the finals with a time of 25.28 seconds. Lee's two strong finishes on the day earned 14 points for the Bobcats in the team standings which is a staggering total considering Quinnipiac compiled 20 points for the weekend on the way to earning the 12^th place finish as a team.

Another group that saw the Bobcats perform well in on the day came in the 4x400m relay as Marlo Wehrer (Pequannock, New Jersey), Nia Baker (Brooklyn, New York), Shameal Samuels (Hartford, Connecticut) and Kristen Ulrich (Clark, New Jersey) combined for the second-fastest time (3:48.67) in program history while earning fourth place overall out of 22 teams in the event.

Alea Simons (Piscataway, New Jersey) battled into the semifinal round of the 60m dash on Friday and advanced to the finals on Saturday with a time of 7.85 seconds in the morning trial event. She went on to place eighth in the finals later in the afternoon with a time of 7.94 seconds. Simons' improvement can be seen clearly through her years as a Bobcat as she had placed no better than 22^nd in the 60m dash in any of her prior appearances at the New England Championships.

Mackenzie Merkel (Hillsdale, New Jersey) bested her own program record in the shot put as she threw 12.09m to eclipse her previous personal-best of 12.03m set back on Dec. 11, 2015. Merkel's career-high throw placed her in a tie for 13^th place out of 24 competitors.

Next up for Quinnipiac is in all likelihood the final meet of the indoor season as the Bobcats head back to the Boston University Track Center on March 5-6 for the ECAC Championships.