Three Lady Tigers To Represent Clemson At The 2003 NCAA Outdoor Track And Field Championships

June 3, 2003

CLEMSON, SC – Three members of the Clemson women’s track and field team have been accepted into the 2003 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships. Gisele Oliveira will represent Clemson at this year’s meet, scheduled for June 11-14 on the campus of Sacramento State University. Costa and Oliveira automatically qualifed for the NCAA Championships, earning top-five finishes at the East Region meet, while Nicholson provisionally qualified for the national meet in the heptathlon at the Orange & Purple Classic.

A senior from Sao Paolo, Brazil, Costa ranks among Clemson’s all-time leaders in the pole vault. She ranks second on the Lady Tigers’ career list with a clearance of 12’10.25″, recorded at the 2003 East Region Championships. A former ACC Champion and four-time All-ACC honoree, Costa placed second at the region meet to earn her berth in this year’s National Championships. Earlier this season, she won the collegiate pole vault event at the Penn Relays, clearing 12’10”. Costa has won four pole vault competitions during the outdoor season this year. She enters the NCAA Championships ranked 25th in the national listings.

Nicholson, a senior from Marietta, GA, ranks second on the Lady Tigers’ career list in the heptathlon. She accumulated a personal-best total of 5,200 points at the 2003 Orange & Purple Classic to provisionally qualify in the heptathlon. At that meet, Nicholson posted personal-record performances in three events, including the 200m, long jump and javelin throw. Nicholson earned All-ACC honors this year, placing third with 5,036 points and four personal-record performances (100m hurdles, high jump, shot put, 800m). She also competed as a member of the Lady Tigers’ 4x400m relay team that qualified for the East Region Championships, and regionally qualified as an individual in the long jump. Entering the NCAA Championships, Nicholson is ranked 25th in the heptathlon field.

A sophomore from Porto Alegre, Brazil, Oliveira is making her second consecutive appearance at the NCAA Outdoor Championships. She will compete in the long jump and triple jump in 2003, ranking 17th and 10th respectively in those events entering the national meet. In 2002, she earned her first All-America accolade, placing seventh in the triple jump at the national outdoor meet with a mark of 43’0.5″. This year, Oliveira set an ACC Championships meet record with her mark of 43’10”, then followed that performance with Clemson record-setting marks at the Penn Relays and Georgia Tech Invitational. She recorded lifetime-best leaps of 43’11.75″ in the triple jump at both meets, and is the Lady Tigers’ career leader in the event. In the long jump, Oliveira recorded her best mark of 20’11.75″ at the Orange & Purple Classic to move into second on Clemson’s all-time list.