49ers in the house! Ooooohhhhh!

Ladies and Gentlemen please welcome the defending and new Atlantic 10 indoor track and field conference CHAMPIONS!! *loud screams*

Yes, we are the champions, guys and girls. The guys came out today and they got it done! Beating the second place team, URI, by over 60 points! Of course on the women's side, defending our dynasty of SIX and now SEVEN straight conference titles in four years, won over second place Dayton by about 40 points. CTS... ON DECK! Ooooooohhhhhhhh!

Sorry, the team chants are ringing in my ears. Its an awesome, joyful sound. The sound of unity, team work, determination, motivation and the sound of the champions. On the women's side, we had a rough day. We were ahead in projected points yesterday, but somewhere today things didn't go so well. We ended up short of the points we were supposed to get, our Achilles heel being not sweeping the 200 and 400 meter dash like we should have. However, some people picked up points. We ended with 167 points, probably our worst conference to date, but we still held out over Dayton by almost 40 points, which is a significant lead. I will give Dayton props though, they stepped it up and did exactly what they came to do. "Close the gap." For the past four years since we entered the A-10, Charlotte women have dominated the field beating the second place teams by at least 60-80 points. They stepped it up and showed Charlotte they will be a force to be reckoned with, but not today. We did what we came to do. Win a championship.

The team has been fantastic! We had cheers for everyone. We kept a good eye on the track and everyone got a chant especially for them as they did their thing. Chase said "Just so you know when you come around this straight away all you hear is a loud rawer." The 4 by 400 team said "Be loud for the girls 4 by 4 team too! That totally pumped us up!" The other teams were getting annoyed and some tried to cheer along their teams louder than us, but that did work. I guess it gives them something else to hate us for, besides beating them. We just got louder and yes my voice is more than a little strained. We had several chants going on, including "CTS... ON DECK! C...T...S... Ooon...Deeck!" (CTS: Charlotte Track Squad), "49ers in the house! Ooooooooooh!", "Fourty... Niner... Fourty... Niner!", and "Moooooove, Moooooove, Moooooove!" We got so into it that along with those chants and screams we started making chants for people's names, especially the relays that are always exciting. We were even good sports and cheered for the Dayton coach getting coach of the year when our coach should have and Paris from Dayton getting athlete of the meet for winning an individual and a relay when our own Lamara should have won since she won two individual titles and a relay. I guess that's just another stab at the Charlotte team. (They really don't like us in this conference.) Our coaches were proud of our sportsman like conduct and said our cheers filled the track and you could hear them from everywhere all day, which was the point, and it wasn't over done as much as the other teams might think.

Coach was interviewed after the meet by the A-10 people and he was asked this question... "Now that you have won so many titles, especially on the women's side, how is this one significant?" His answer is exactly what everyone would agree with and what he told us at our meeting tonight. "This meet has had a whole new feel about it for our teams. They have really come together and supported each other. I would say it was gift. A gift from Steven. I would never want a tragedy like that to happen, but these teams are doing him proud and are really coming together to honor him. This was for him." Before we left the track we all huddled up, all 72 of us, and did a 49er chant ending with "Steve" on three. Today was Steven's birthday and he would have been 20, I think he is very proud of us and was running and cheering along with us the whole time.

Now we are looking and working towards our outdoor championship in May in our house!

"Shannon, your first vault yesterday gave me life! I was cheering the whole time, did you hear me? I was going 'WOOOOOOOOOH!' At first I didn't think that pole was going to bend and then it did! It bent all the way down and your little body just went flying!" -Derek