Rivers and Holmberg Earn Regional Athlete of the Year AwardsRivers and Holmberg Earn Regional Athlete of the Year Awards

Rivers and Holmberg Earn Regional Athlete of the Year Awards

USTFCCCA Release

UNIVERSITY PARK. Pa.
- Two Penn State track & field student-athletes brought home Athlete of the Year honors as announced by the U.S Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA). 

Danae Rivers was named Mid-Atlantic Region Women's Track Athlete of the Year and Maddie Holmberg was named Mid-Atlantic Region Women's Field Athlete of the Year.

Rivers and Holmberg are set to compete at this week's NCAA Indoor Championships held in Birmingham, Alabama. 

Rivers won her third consecutive Big Ten Indoor 800-meter title last week and broke the Big Ten meet record with a time of 2:03.45.  Rivers is just the third woman to win three consecutive Big Ten Indoor 800-meter championships. Earlier this year, Rivers set the NCAA record in the 1,000-meter distance race with a time of 2:38.58. This is also Rivers' third consecutive year winning Mid-Atlantic Region Track Athlete of the Year.  

Holmberg heads back to the NCAA Indoor Championships after finishing seventh in 2018.  Holmberg is currently ranked sixth in the pentathlon with 4219 points and 22nd in the long jump with a distance of 6.22m.  Holmberg was named an All-American last season in her respective field.  Holmberg is the first Nittany Lion to win Mid-Atlantic Field Athlete of the Year since 2016 (Rachel Fatherly). 

Rivers (800-meters), Holmberg (pentathlon), Alexis Holmes (400-meters), Morgan Shigo (weight throw), David Lucas (weight throw) and Domenic Perretta (800-meters) will represent the Nittany Lions at the 2019 NCAA Indoor Championships this weekend.

ESPN3 will stream the championships live starting at 6:30 p.m. ET on Friday, March 8 and starting at 5 p.m. ET on Saturday, March 9. A re-air of the championship will take place starting at 10 p.m. ET on Sunday, March 10 on ESPN2 and again on Monday, March 11 starting at 10 p.m. ET on ESPNU.

For more information regarding the Division I indoor track and field championships, log on to www.ncaa.com.