EVANSVILLE, Ind. – After a short week of practice, the University of Evansville track and field team will return to action on Friday, as the Purple Aces will travel to Charleston, Illinois to take part in the Eastern Illinois Big Blue Meet.  The meet will begin at 10 a.m. with field events, while track events will begin at 4 p.m.  Friday evening's track events will be broadcast live on ESPN+.

Evansville competed last weekend in Murray, Kentucky at the Margaret Simmons Invitational.  The UE men placed sixth out of 23 teams, while the women placed 21st overall.  Senior Joey Rucinski (Ft. Wayne, Ind./Concordia Lutheran) placed second in the pole vault and third in the javelin throw to lead the UE men.  Meanwhile, on the women's side, senior McKenna Sapp (Bloomington, Ill./University) placed seventh in the pole vault to pace the Purple Aces place-wise.

"This Friday is going to be a smaller meet, but there will still be some good competition with Eastern Illinois and Indiana State being there," said UE head coach Don Walters.  "Our goal is to continue to go out and hunt PRs.  We are a little banged up injury-wise right now, but I still think that we can go out and set PRs and continue to improve this weekend."

On the meet's start list, Evansville has the top performer by previous performance in the men's triple jump with freshman Denzel Lasam (St. Louis, Mo./De Smet) as well as the women's 800- and 1,500-meters with graduate student Anna Lowry (Taylorville, Ill./Taylorville).  UE senior Trey Riggs (Ft. Branch, Ind./Gibson Southern) is also ranked as the second-fastest competitor in the men's 110-meter hurdles heading into Friday.

Friday's EIU Big Blue Meet will feature teams from UE, EIU, Indiana State, Lincoln College, and St. Mary-of-the-Woods.