Michael Nicholls Wins Southland Indoor Title In 60-Meter Hurdles

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama – Freshman Michael Nicholls made individual and program history on the final day of the 2016 Southland Conference Indoor Championship as the freshman from Barbados set a school record en route to winning the men's 60-meter hurdles on Tuesday afternoon in the Birmingham SportsPlex.

His 7.97 in the event surpasses his own mark of 7.99, set on Jan. 31 during the KMS Indoor Invitational on the very same track, and Nicholls becomes the first UNO student-athlete to earn an SLC individual title since the Privateers joined the league prior to the 2013-14 school year.

"He had a tough start but he stayed engaged, finished the race and ended up victorious," UNO head coach Benjamin Dalton said. "It should have been a 7.8 performance. He got left in the blocks, but really showed composure. In the Southland Conference, that's what it takes."

On the women's, junior Alexia Fortenberry finished runner-up in the women's 60-meter hurdles with a mark of 8.43, two-tenths of a second behind Sam Houston State's Danielle Demas (8.23). Nicholls' mark was five one-hundredths of a second better than Stephen F. Austin's Kerry Gleason's 8.02.

Nicholls' school record was one of five season-best performances by the Privateers on Tuesday. While Fadeke Adeola led New Orleans in the high jump with a leap of 1.60 meters to finish 10th, Erin Chopin cleared a season-best 1.55 meters to come in tied for 17th. Jordan Courtois' 3.35 meters in the pole vault was also a season-best and good enough for an 11th-place finish at the SLC meet, and the tandem of Callie Willcox and Emily Martinez followed suit in the 3000 meters with respective times of 11:00.17 and 11:26.35.

Tuesday's performance comes a day after the New Orleans program tallied a dozen season-best performances. Headlining the list of accomplishments from the opening day of the SLC Indoor Championship was freshman Kohi Brignac, who broke her own school record of 11.72 meters with a toss of 11.86 meters to finish 17th in the event.

Joining Brignac on the women's team to post season-best marks on Monday were junior Chelise Brown in the 60 meter dash and freshman Ja'Nai Cameron in the 400 meters. On the men's side, freshman Quintarius Queen, junior Dario Scantlebury, junior Darren Darensburg and junior Edmund Pine each posted a pair of season-best marks while junior Jared Robertson did so once.

While the bulk of the UNO team will now turn its attention toward the outdoor season, select individuals will continue indoor action on Friday, Feb. 19 at the LSU Twilight in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The 2016 NCAA Indoor Championship is slated for March 11-12.