Saturday afternoon, Oregon track and field set a meet record in the women’s 4×400 meter relay to put an exclamation mark on a historic 2012 season. Unfortunately, the women of Louisiana State put the finishing touches one of a remarkable all-round performance to narrowly edge the Ducks for the national title.
In Des Moines, the Oregon women set a program record for points in an NCAA meet (62), eclipsing their previous best of 57. That total would have been good enough to win the NCAA title five of the past seven years. But LSU racked up 76 points in an array of events to relegate the Ducks to a second-place finish for the fourth consecutive year.
“We came out and competed hard, (LSU) came out and competed hard,” associate athletic director Vin Lananna said to GoDucks.com. “LSU just came out and had a great meet. LSU just had a better one.”
Texas A&M, the three-time defending champ, came in third with 38 points. Clemson and Kansas tied for fourth with 28.
On the final day of competition, Oregon’s women 4×400 put together the team’s last great performance of the season. English Gardner, Chizoba Okodogbe, Laura Roesler and Phyllis Francis won in a meet-record 3:24.54.
“We knew it was going to be really close,” Francis said to GoDucks.com. “We really wanted it this year.”
Gardner led off the race for the Ducks, completing her lap in 50.81. Okodogbe then took the baton and finished her leg in 51.53, with Oregon trailing LSU by a second halfway through the race. On the third leg, Roesler finished in 51.86 to chip away at the Tigers lead. Francis then closed in style, crossing the line in 50.15 to beat out LSU by less than a tenth of a second (0.05).
The Ducks’ time was not only a record mark for the NCAAs. The mark is also a Pac-12 record and the second-fastest time in NCAA history, trailing only Texas’ time of 3:23.75 from 2004.
Jordan Hasay and Becca Friday participated in a final in the women’s 1,500 meters that was also a nail-biter. The field remained tightly bunch through the first three laps before Amanda Winslow of Florida State broke away in the last few hundred meters.
A wild finish saw Hasay, Katie Flood of Washington and Emily Infeld of Georgetown kick towards the lead. Flood made a surge to win in 4:13.79, with Infeld second in 4:14.02 and Hasay third in 4:14.03. Friday was ninth in 4:16.38.
“It was an exciting race,” Hasay said to GoDucks.com. “It certainly lived up to expectations.”
“You always think you could have done a little better here or done something a little differently there,” Lananna said to GoDucks.com. “But in the end, 62 points — the women really had a pretty good meet. LSU just had a better one.”
The Ducks also got five points in the 4×100 relay with a fourth-place finish. Francis, Gardner, Lauryn Newson and Amber Purvis ran 43.58.
In the women’s 5,000 meters, Alex Kosinski finished eighth in 16:24.42, while freshman Allie Woodward was 13th in 16:43.92.
In the triple jump, Newson’s best effort of 42-9.75/13.05m was good enough for 11th.
The Duck men, who had no entries on Saturday, finished tied for ninth with Texas with 22 points.
“Not a bad team finish considering how many freshmen and sophomores we had here,” Lananna said to GoDucks.com.
Florida won the men’s team title with 50 points, followed by LSU with 48, Texas A&M with 40 and Florida State with 38.