Coming off a dominant 2008-09 season, the men’s track and field team will look to repeat its victory in the Indoor Heptagonal Championship.

The Red is coming off its seventh consecutive Ivy League Heps Outdoor Championship last spring, which equaled a similar streak by Penn in the 1970s.

Highlights from last season also included 15 NCAA Regional qualifiers, and Heps champion Garrett Huyler ’09 receiving All-American accolades in the high jump.

Although the Red graduated some of its top performers, including Huyler, head coach Na­than Taylor welcomes in a strong freshman class.

Leading the jumpers is senior co-captain Duane Teixiera, who was the Most Outstanding Performer at last year’s Heps.

Senior Gary Jones and junior Julian Remouns are just two other names on a deep list of athletes who will help make the jumps one of Cornell’s strongest areas. Coming into this year, Cornell jumpers have either won or scored in three straight NCAA championships.

Juniors Adrien Dannemiller and Nate Edelman lead a distance squad that looks to fill the void left by two graduating Heps champions. Distance is one area in particular where the Red looks to be strengthened significantly by newcomers, including two high school state cham­pions and Rob Micikas, the Penn Relays champion in the 3000 meters.

The women’s team looks to im­prove im­mense­ly with the addition of 23 new freshmen, including seven state high school champions.

In the spring, the Red finished one spot short of matching its male counterparts’ Outdoor Heps victory, finishing a close second to Princeton and abruptly ending Cornell’s seven-year win streak at the meet.

The Red, however, had gotten the best of the Tigers and the rest of the field by picking up its seventh Indoor Heps championship last winter. Jeomi Maduka ’09 was named the meet’s Most Outstanding Performer after winning four events and setting two meet records.

A big void has been left on the Red by the graduation of Maduka, one of the most accomplished athletes in Cornell track and field history. Maduka concluded her collegiate career by finishing seventh and 12th in the long and triple jump, respectively, at the NCAA championships.

The Red does, however, return several top performers from last year’s squad.

Junior Natalie Gengel will look to have another strong season in the pole vault, while sophomore Melissa Hewitt, who impressed at last spring’s Outdoor Heps, will lead the sprinters. Senior Stephanie Pancoast will look to follow-up her strong finish in the steeplechase from last year as well.