After an SEC Indoor Championship performance in which she was the top female point scorer with 21 points, Texas A&M junior Tyra Gittens earned 2020 SEC Women’s Field Athlete of the Year honors, the SEC announced on Wednesday.
“It’s a hard earned and well deserved accomplishment, and to be recognized by the coaches says a lot,” A&M coach Pat Henry said. “Coaches know talent and she is a talented woman. She pushes herself to get better all the time and she’s only scratching the surface right now, I think she is going to be really good.”
Also at the conference championship meet, Gittens set an SEC meet and A&M record in the pentathlon with 4,391 points. She added a third place victory in the high jump and fourth place in the long jump.
Gittens is currently ranked No. 1 in the nation in the pentathlon, No. 3 in the high jump and No. 11 in the long jump, and is the only female athlete to be competing in three individual events at the NCAA Indoor Championships.
Gittens will begin competition in the national championship meet on Friday with the pentathlon set to start at 12:15 p.m. The long jump competition is set for 7:55 p.m. on Friday, while the high jump is slated for a 2:15 p.m. start time on Saturday.