McNeese State will host the Jeff Davis Bank/McNeese Invitational indoor track and field meet Friday and Saturday at the university's Ralph O.Ward rec-center.

            It's the second meet for McNeese to host this season and colleges will run on Friday and high schools on Saturday.  Friday's meet will begin at 1 p.m. with field events followed by running events at 4 p.m.  Saturday's meet will begin at 9 a.m.  Admission is $5 with children under 12 admitted free.

            Joining McNeese for the college division of the meet will be UL-Lafayette, Southeastern Louisiana, Nicholls State (women's team only), Hinds Junior College (women's team only) and South Alabama (pole vaulters only).

            Southeastern Louisiana won the men's division of the first McNeese home meet of the season with the Cowboys placing second while the Cowgirls took the women's title.

            Cowboy head coach and meet director Brendon Gilroy looks for another good effort from his Cowboys and Cowgirls as well as from the other athletes in attendance.

            He points to his own Jordan Neil and David Rooney in the mile run, Tinette Burger and Amy Guinn and Nicholls State's Katy Windstat and Brea Goodman in the women's mile run and Southeastern's Adonson Shallow and Feisle Muhammed in the weight throw and shot put.

            Shallow has earned several Southland Conference athlete of the week honors this season and he will go in with a league best 65-10 ¼ in the weight throw and second best of 57-2 ¼ in the shot put.

            Both the hurdles and the short sprint  will be 55 meters and not the 60 meters. Southeastern Louisiana's Damion Manning has run an 8.08 in the 60 hurdles and McNeese's Charles Jackson has run a 6.91 in the 60 meters.

            The Cowboy distance medley relay team of Neil, Michael Washington, Michael Dyer and Jonathan Koenck has the top time in the conference, a 10:16.69 which they ran at the Texas Tech meet.

            Rooney came close to a school record in the 3000 meter run in the first McNeese meet and he'll take a crack at the school mile record of 4:11.46 which was set by Kris Gilmore in 2002.  He ran a 4:14.78 last week.

            Other key individuals are expected to be Lion pole vaulter Kovey Simmons who has gone 16-0 and high jumper Corey Billizone who has a 6-8 ¾ best.  McNeese's Sunny Singh could challenge in the high jump.

            In the women's division, Burger will mark her season debut in the mile while Guinn has run a 5:16.41.  The school record and complex record is 4:49.4 which was posted by Sita Waru in 2000.