May 26, 1998

MONMOUTH,IL --- Senior Heather Furrow (Kirkwood,IL/HS) ended her record-setting track career at Monmouth College with three All-American awards at last weekend’s NCAA Division III National Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. Furrow’s efforts led a contingent of 12 Monmouth student-athletes and brought to a close the most successful career by a female athlete in Fighting Scot track history. In three seasons she earned a total of 10 indoor and outdoor Division III All-American finishes and her three outdoor 1998 awards tied her own single-season school record.

The senior sprinter/hurdler duplicated last year’s results as she won two All-American awards in individual events and one as part of Monmouth’s 4x100-meter relay team. The top 8 finishers in each event during the three-day championships were recognized as NCAA All-Americans and Furrow’s races were all contested on Saturday afternoon. She earned her first award in the relay and in the process helped Monmouth to its fourth consecutive top-8 finish in the 4x100. Senior Stacy Brown (Barrington,IL/Lake Zurich), junior Christy Keller (Crystal Lake,IL/Central) and freshman Constance Jackson (Peoria,IL/Woodruff) joined with Furrow to run 48.09 seconds in the final. It was the squad’s third-fastest time of the season, trailing only their qualifying time of :47.95 and their preliminary-round effort of :47.97. It was third relay All-American award for both Brown and Furrow and the second for Keller.

Furrow finished 8th at 400 meters with a finals time of 56.37 seconds, only .04 seconds off of her own team record and career-best time. She had run a season-best :56.78 in Friday’s qualifying heats to advance to the eight-woman final. Furrow then completed the triple with a 4th-place finish in the 400-meter intermediate hurdles, an event in which she had placed seventh as a junior. She had placed second in her preliminary heat (1:02.45) on Thursday to advance and then clocked 1:02.81 in the final.

Senior Chris Sondgeroth (Pekin,IL/Erie) also returned to the award stand after placing 4th in the men’s shot put. Sondgeroth, who finished third in 1997 as a junior, uncorked a season-best effort of 54'3¼" on his final throw to improve two places and secure his third individual All-American honor. His first-round throw of 53'8" was the sixth-best among the nine qualifiers for the finals.

Monmouth athletes also had their share of close calls at the national meet. Two seniors barely missed national honors by finishing 9th in their respective events. Dennis Staggs (Farmington,IL/HS) advanced to the finals in the 110-meter high hurdles but came up .03 seconds short of a top-8 place with a time of 14.76 seconds. Tennille McClure (Taylor Ridge,IL/Rockridge) also advanced to the final round in the discus but her best toss of 133'2" fell eight inches short. Jackson placed 10th in the women’s 200m prelims with a time of 25.37 seconds and missed advancing to the finals by only .02 seconds.

The men’s 4x400 relay team of seniors Toby Vallas (Knoxville,IL/HS) and David Kimber (Dolton,IL/St. Rita), sophomore Rich Johnson (Galesburg,IL/HS) and freshman Justin Bryant (Knoxville,IL/HS) also did not advance out of the heats with their prelim time of 3:17.42. In addition to the 200, Jackson finished 19th in the 100m (:12.68) and Brown placed 16th in both the 100m (:12.46) and the 200m (:25.56) dashes. Senior Jim Hardesty (Canton,IL/HS) competed in the men's discus but failed to advance to the final round.

Monmouth placed 18th in the women’s team standings with 10 points and finished 43rd in the men’s division with 5 points.