Jan. 13, 2004

WACO, Texas - The Baylor women's track and field is ranked 16th, while the men are ranked 20th in the season's first Trackwire 25 power rankings released today. The Bears begin the indoor season on Saturday as they travel to the Oklahoma Classic at the Mosier Facility in Norman, Okla.

"That's probably a good start," said head coach Clyde Hart, who is entering his 41st season at the helm of the Baylor program. "Because of the number of scholarships the women have a better opportunity to be ranked higher and we have a good nucleus returning with Lakadron Ivery, Jordan Willmann, April Holliness and Angela Marvin.

"For the men, 20th is a fair assumption. We have the nucleus there as well to finish much higher, but we'll just have to wait and see."

The women return a pair of All-Americans in junior long jumper April Holliness and senior heptathlete Jordan Willmann, who each finished fifth in their respective events at last year's NCAA Outdoor Championships. The men return five All-Americans in seniors Joel Martin and Robert Quiroga, sophomores Jeremy Wariner and Jamen Saziru and junior Darold Williamson. Each have been a member of an All-American 4x400-meter relay team, while Wariner and Williamson are All-Americans individually in the 400 meters.

Defending indoor and outdoor national champion LSU begins the season as No. 1 in the women's rankings, while Arkansas is the men's favorite heading into the indoor season. For the entire Trackwire 25, visit www.trackwire.com.

The Trackwire 25 projects a hypothetical score for the NCAA meet, factoring in injury reports and other variables supported by information gathered from coaches and NCAA-qualifying competitions across the country. This projection is generated by scoring the Dandy Dozen, a power ranking of the top 12 athletes and relay squads in each NCAA event.