Emma Erickson and Shaneaka Parkes of The University of South Dakota women's track and field team were named the North Central Conference Outdoor Women's Track and Field Athletes of the Week in an announcement April 22 by the league office. Erickson was named the track athlete of the week while Parkes earned field athlete of the week honors.

Erickson (Fr., Gayville) broke USD's school record with a clocking of 2:07.57 to finish second in the 800-meter run at the Mount SAC Relays. Erickson, who broke Jennifer Munyan's 1997 record of 2:09.82, had the best 800-meter performance in Division II this season while recording an automatic qualifying time for the outdoor national championships.

She was also was a member of two relays that met provisional qualifying marks for outdoor nationals. Erickson led USD's 4x400-meter relay to a fifth-place finish with a provisional mark of 3:47.17 at the Mount SAC Relays. She was also a part of the women's 4x100 meter relay which met the provisional qualifying mark twice this weekend. The relay finished fourth with a clocking of :47.36 at the Long Beach Invitational and finished third with a time of :47.43 on Friday at the Mount SAC Relays.

Parkes (Jr., St. Ann, Minard Hill, Jamaica) recorded an automatic and was part of four provisional marks (individual and relay) for outdoor nationals during competition in California this past weekend. Parkes had an automatic qualifying mark with a fourth-place throw of 149'0 in the javelin at the Mt. SAC Relays. She also had a provisional mark of 142'01 in finishing seventh in the javelin at the Long Beach Invitational. At that same meet, she was 11th in the 200-meter dash with a provisional time of :24.76.

In addition, she was a member of the 4x100-meter relay squad that had two provisional marks.