Last weekend at the Big 12 Conference Indoor Championships, the Iowa State women’s track and field team didn’t have much to cheer about en route to their 11th-place finish.

However, the fact that the Cyclone’s top finisher in 8 of 14 events was either a sophomore or a freshman means that things are headed in the right direction.

Of the 17 points scored by Iowa State, 12 of them were scored by underclassmen. Going even deeper, the Cyclones only saw two events that a senior was the best among them, the 3,000 and 5,000-meter runs.

“We’re young, and that’s just where we’re at [as a program],” head coach Corey Ihmels said. “We need to get more points on the board, but I thought we made some progress.”

That progress may be hard to see from someone on the outside looking in, but all of the athletes and coaches are encouraged by what they have seen from the young athletes of the program.

“The direction we’re going is amazing,” said senior Amy Waggoner. “Seeing what the freshmen did this weekend, it’s great things they’re going to be able to do in the future building on this experience they got.”

Waggoner is the only senior in the group of throwers that fielded three top 10’s in two events. Freshman Danielle Frere finished ninth in the shot put competition and freshman Laishema Hampton finished seventh in the weight throw, just .69 meters ahead of Waggoner’s 10th-place performance.