Inga Stasiulionyte used to dominate the
Pacific-10 Conference javelin scene. The former USC star swept the javelin event at the Pac-10 Championships each season of her career, which spanned from 2001-04.
Each season, Oregon’s Sarah Malone finished behind the four-time All-American and Pac-10 record holder. The fifth-year senior finally sees a clear path to a javelin title this season now that Stasiulionyte has graduated.
“I’ve gotten second the last three years I’ve been at the Pac-10’s, so it will finally be a time where I can come out on top hopefully,” said Malone, the Pac-10’s leading javelin thrower this season. “The competition is mostly with my teammates, past and present.”
Malone will have to compete against teammates Roslyn Lundeen, Elisa Crumley and Rachael Kriz Wallace as well as Washington’s Tiffany Zahn, her former Newberg High School teammate.
Malone’s main competition will be junior Jenna Dean of Washington State, whose mark is only eight feet shorter than Malone’s season-best of 177 feet, 3/4 inches.
Oregon will send 24 female athletes to Los Angeles for the Pac-10s at UCLA’s Drake Stadium this weekend.
Multi-event athletes got a head start on
collecting team points last weekend. Oregon juniors Lauryn Jordan
and Lundeen rustled up six points that will go toward the team score this weekend and “may prove crucial,” Oregon assistant coach Rock Light said.
Light has Jordan slated to compete in the long jump, high jump, triple jump and 4×100 relay.
“I’m going to definitely try to get top-three in all the jumps,” Jordan said. “I’m going to go out there and cheer on my teammates and hope everybody gets good marks and we place higher than last year.”
In 2004, Oregon finished seventh for the second-straight season with only 58 points. The Ducks have
not won the championship meet since 1992.
Seniors Clarice Hayward-Lee and Maegan Traver will be working to score points for Oregon and also regional qualifying marks for themselves in the triple jump.
“Usually the big meets are my thing so I’m hoping this is the case,” Traver said. “It’s not like I’m on top with a lot of pressure, so I can relax and do my thing.”
Oregon is looking for scoring contributions from events other than jumping and throwing. Light said Kayla Mellott and Kasey Harwood give Oregon a “really solid one-two punch” in the 400-meter hurdles.
Both are running the 4×100 and the 4×400 relays, but they are only expected to finish with mediocre times and to scavenge leftover points.
“The relays are not our strongest events; we’re just not there right now,” Light said. “This is their opportunity to show what they can do.”
Seniors Laura Harmon and
Magdalena Sandoval are two of the Ducks’ three distance runners competing this weekend. They are scheduled to run the 5,000-meters.
“Pac-10s is always exciting; the environment there is different and anything can happen, which adds a really nice element to it,” Traver said. “It will be nice to get out in the sunshine and put up some good marks.”
Portions of the two-day meet will be televised May 21 on Fox Sports Northwest from noon to 2 p.m. and May 24 from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.

[email protected]