Tanise Thornton-Fillyaw Advances to Women's 800-Meter Final at Nationals

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. - Goucher College women's indoor track and field sophomore Tanise Thornton-Fillyaw advanced to the final of the women's 800-meter run final at the NCAA Division III Indoor Track and Field Championship Friday afternoon at the Virginia Beach Sports Center.

Thornton-Fillyaw, running in the second of three heats in the 20-athlete field Friday, ran a school and Landmark Conference-record time of 2:10.18, lowering her own record for both marks from the 2:11.51 she ran at the Landmark Championship two weeks ago.  She led the first three laps, running an opening 29.97 200, 1:02.85 through 400 meters and 1:37.02 through 600 meters.  On the final lap Thornton-Fillyaw was overtaken by Hope Murphy of Baldwin-Wallace, who had the fastest preliminary time at 2:09.72.  The top two runners from each heat moved through to the finals.

Thornton-Fillyaw ran the fourth-fastest preliminary time, with Emma Kelley of Washington-St. Louis (2:09.89) and Megan Bell of Rochester (2:10.17) placing second and third.  All eight qualifiers for Saturday's final are separated by 1.56 seconds.

Saturday's final is set for 4:50 pm and can be seen live on NCAA.com.