By DONNY NADEAU
Saint Mary's Sports Information Director
 
WINONA, Minn. — The Saint Mary's University men's and women's track and field teams kick off their 2019 indoor season on Saturday, hosting the Saint Mary's Early Birdinal at the Gostomski Fieldhouse.
 
The Saint Mary's Early Birdinal Field:
• Saint Mary's, Winona State, Bethany Lutheran
 
Cardinals' Last Action:
• Saturday's Saint Mary's Early Birdinal is the 2018 indoor season opener for the Cardinals.
 
Cardinals At Saint Mary's Early Birdinal — A Year Ago:
• January 13, 2018 * Winona, Minn.: The Cardinal men recorded 21 Top 3 finishes — including a first-place triple by Kyle Lichttenegger — while the Saint Mary's women put together six Top 5 efforts in the non-team-scored event at Gostomski Fieldhouse | Recap
 
Up Next:
• The Cardinals are back on the track next Saturday, as Saint Mary's travels to Menomonie, Wis., to take part in the UW-Stout Open.
 
Scouting The Saint Mary's Cardinals:
2019 Men's Roster | 2019 Women's Roster | 2019 Schedule | Record Book
• Becca Dup (Albert Lea, Minn.) became the Cardinals' first All-American since 2007, placing sixth in the triple jump at the NCAA Division III Outdoor National Championships with a leap of 11.79m. … Dup also placed 11^th in the long jump (5.62m) at the 2018 outdoor national championships. … Dup—who posted a school-record leap of 11.80m at the UW-La Crosse Last Chance Meet on May 17 to qualify for the outdoor national championships—became the first Cardinal since Amanda Weinmann and Ashley Luehmann in 2017 to earn All-American status. … Dup (long jump & triple jump), Maria Missurelli (Franklin, Wis. / pole vault), and Austin O'Hare (Rushford, Minn. / steeplechase) all earned USTFCCCA All-Region honors during the 2018 outdoor season. … The Cardinals closed out the outdoor season breaking three school records—and crowning a pair of conference champions—at the MIAC Outdoor Championships. … Missurelli broke her own school record in the pole vault, winning the event with a mark of 3.56 meters, while Dup blew away the rest of the field in winning the triple jump with a then-record-setting 11.70-meter effort. … The women's 4x100 relay team of Dup, Portia Mensah (Bloomington, Minn.), Alexis Floresca (Romeoville, Ill.), and Hannah Crowe (Baraboo, Wis.) posted Saint Mary's third record-setting effort, placing third with a time of 49.39. … Dup also earned her third All-MIAC honor in the long jump, placing second with a leap of 5.53 meters. … Brandon Krogman (Owatonna, Minn.) also posted an All-MIAC performance for the Cardinal men, placing third in the 800 with a time of 1:53.47. … Floresca, Austin O'Hare (Rushford, Minn.), Connor Nicholas (Las Vegas, Nev.), and Rachel Ohde (Chetek, Wis.) all earned honorable-mention All-MIAC honors at the outdoor season-ending conference championships. Floresca placed fifth in the 100 (12.55), O'Hare finished fifth in the steeplechase (9:36.41), Ohde was fifth in the high jump (1.56m), and Nicholas placed sixth in the hammer (47.67m). … Dup broke her own school record in the long jump with a leap of 5.74 meters at the Saint Mary's Open on April 28. … Krogman broke the school record in the 800 with a winning time of 1:53.17 at the UW-La Crosse Phil Esten Challenge on April 21. … During the outdoor season, the Cardinal women recorded 13 top-five all-time performances—including four school records, while the Saint Mary's men posted six top-five efforts and Krogman's school record in the 800. … The Cardinal men posted an eighth-place finish in the indoor season-ending MIAC Championships, while the Saint Mary's women placed ninth. … The eighth-place finish was the Cardinal men's team's highest indoor finish in program history. … Dup and Krogman each claimed a pair of indoor conference titles — Dup's in the long and triple jumps, and Krogman's in the 600 and 800—at the MIAC Indoor Championships. … Dup defended her MIAC indoor title in the long jump with a leap of 5.38 meters, while claiming her first conference triple jump title by equaling her school record with a leap of 11.74 meters. … Dup's 11.74-meter jump also earned the Cardinal junior her second straight NCAA national championship appearance. Dup, who placed 17^th in the triple jump at the 2017 outdoor national championships, narrowly missed All-American honors at the 2018 indoor championships, placing ninth with a leap of 11.67m. … Krogman joined Dup in standing atop the MIAC indoor podium twice, as the Cardinal senior followed up his conference-winning performance in the 800—where he won with a time of 1:55.87—by shattering his own school record in running away from the 600 field in collecting conference title No. 2 with a time of 1:21.50. … Desmond Steward (Bayside, Wis.) chipped in a second-place All-MIAC showing in the triple jump at the MIAC Indoor Championships, notching a leap of 13.72 meters, while Nicholas also landed all-conference honors with a third in the 60 hurdles (8.58). … Missurelli put together the best indoor championships of her career, breaking her own school record in the pole vault—clearing an All-MIAC 3.45 meters—to finish second behind St. Thomas' Kendall Novak, who won the event with a vault of 3.55 meters. … Dup (long jump, triple jump), Missurelli (pole vault), Steward (triple jump), and Krogman (800) all earned USTFCCCA Indoor All-Region honors. … Four of Saint Mary's five first-place showings at UW-Stout's Warren Bowlus Invitational on Jan. 27 were, at the time, school-record performances—Missurelli in the pole vault (3.40m), Dup in the triple jump (11.03m), Krogman in the 600 meter (1:23.06), and O'Hare in the 3,000 (8:43.45). … Kyle Lichttenegger's (De Pere, Wis.) 6.84-meter leap in the long jump and Krogman's 2:44.10 in the 1,000 at the Saint Mary's Early Birdinal on Jan. 13 were both school records. … The Saint Mary's men finished with 17 top-five all-time performances during the indoor season—including five school records—with the women adding 12 top-fives and four new school marks.