HOUSTON, Texas - Led by three gold medals from Brianna Howard, several members of the Lamar University track and field teams tallied multiple medals to add to the team scores on the final day of the Southland Conference Outdoor Championship meet. While the women's side made a big surge to move up the standings, their final total of 118.5 points was enough for third place behind conference champion Northwestern State (182.50) and second place McNeese (181). The men would end the meet fifth with 71 points behind conference champion UIW.
 
Howard was one of two Cardinals to break a conference meet record along with Chloe Rodriguez to win their respective events. Rodriguez set a new standard in the 400-meter hurdles as she broke the school and conference mark with a 57.02. The previous holder was Chante'sean White of Texas State in 2012. Howard won the 200 meters with a time of 23.01, which bested the previous mark of 23.05 from Southeastern Louisiana's Christine Amertil 24 years ago.
 
But Howard wasn't finished as she teamed up with Kayla Smith, Kayli Johnson and Sydne Porter to pull off a come-from-behind 4x100m win over Texas A&M-Corpus Christi. Their time of 44.83 edged the Islanders by .13 seconds and is now the fourth-best mark in conference history. Then, Howard would make it three-for-three in gold medals on the day as she crossed the line of the 100m with a new personal best of 11.36.
 
Porter became a silver medalist in the same event finishing at 11.72. She and Smith then joined Adebola Odunlami and Faith Outing for the women's 4x400m relay team. That group snagged bronze with a school record time of 3:41.80. Kayli Johnson later added a third conference medal when she placed second in the finals of the 100H at 13.80.  
 
The cross country trio of Nia Clatworthy, Cara Inch, and Freddy Richardson combined to earn four medals on the day. After placing second to New Orleans' Rebecca DeKay in the 10,000m Thursday, Clatworthy flipped the script in the women's 5,000m as she bested DeKay to earn her a gold medal with a time of 17:39.87. Inch was a bronze medalist in both the 5,000m (17:51.30) and the 1,500m (4:28.95) in which both times were personal bests. Richardson found himself in a tight men's 5,000m battle before he held off the fourth place finisher by posting his time of 3:53.10.

After five jumps in the men's triple jump competition, Jacarrius Demmeritte found himself sitting in ninth place. But with one massive leap of 15.01m (49'3"), the Ft. Worth senior ran up seven spots to earn himself a silver medal.  Ethan Ellis added two medals for his day as he earned silver in the 400H finals (51.74). Later, he teamed up with Cameron Chin, Christian Johnson and Jaylon Roberts in the finals of the men's 4x400m. Together, the group of four finished as bronze medalists with 3:08.43.
 
In total, the Cardinals recorded 18 medals, which includes six gold, five silver, and seven bronze medals.

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