Jackson Mestler is now on the collegiate leaderboard.
The Oregon senior stopped the clock at 8:44.84 in his home stadium Hayward Field on Saturday evening, recording the No. 3 time in the NCAA this season in the men’s 3000-meter steeplechase, just 0.12 off his personal best.
Mestler sustained his narrow lead heading into the final lap and swiftly passed Stanford’s Ky Robinson who recorded a time of 8:45.32, one second behind Mestler.
As Mestler approached the last 100 meters of his victory lap, he was met with applause and cheers from fans in attendance and fist bumped a fan in the first row. The Eugene native threw up the “O” with his hands as his teammates celebrated his victory in the green-colored seats at Hayward.
“It’s a beautiful day with sunny weather,” Mestler said. “People travel around the country to get weather like this and we happened to have it here this weekend so I wanted to take advantage of it and just go. My technique has been solid. The build-up has been solid and I knew I was in shape.”
Following Mestler’s victory, the lights along the 76 curved wooden beams surrounding the stadium lit up, glistening against the track and down on the athletes. The sun started to set as the bright Hayward lights shone bright.
The rest of Oregon’s team had to celebrate Mestler’s victory from afar, however. The jumpers and sprinters traveled to Tucson, Arizona, for the other half of the West Coast Classic, while the distance runners and throwers competed in Eugene for a dual-host meet. Both the men’s and women’s teams swept the meet, scoring 138 and 134 points, respectively.
Immediately following Mestler’s grand steeplechase performance, Oregon freshman Elliott Cook didn’t skip a beat in the men’s 800-meter run.
The race was tight throughout with all runners clocking a time in between 54 and 55 seconds at the halfway point. In third place heading into the final lap, Cook kicked up the last leg and was neck-in-neck with four other runners.
With the final 50 meters left, it was anyone’s race to grab.
Stanford’s Miles Smith came from behind in seventh place and crept into fourth and Cal’s Moises Medrano fell back a few paces. In the final moments, both Cook and Cal freshman Garrett MacQuiddy were synchronous in their steps — their legs moving at the same exact pace, their arms frantically swaying back and forth, gnawing toward the finish line.
A hair ended up separating the two in the end, with Cook finishing a heartbreaking one-hundredth of a second behind MacQuiddy to stand in second at 1:49.98. MacQuiddy finished first at 1:49.97, sticking out his neck by a hair further to secure the Cal victory.
The crowd let out a simultaneous, loud gasp when the final displayed the amount of time separating the two runners.
Even though Cook was within one-hundredth of a second of a victory, the freshman clocked a personal best and became the fifth Oregon male to record under 1:50.00 in the event this season.
Another personal best came from redshirt junior Jared Briere in the men’s hammer throw. Finishing in sixth, Briere added more than four feet to his personal best of 58.17m/190-10. His teammate Austin Tharp finished in front of him in fifth place.
Senior Hannah Reinhardt surpassed her personal best in the 1500-meter race from May 19 with a time of 4:14.91. She finished 0.76 seconds behind Stanford’s Ella Donaghu.
“I’ve definitely felt like I’ve built up my speed a lot in the last two weeks, and honestly, I just wanted to go for a PR,” Reinhardt said. “I haven’t run the [1,500 meters] in almost two years so it was time. I wanted to commit to a hard pace right off the rip and go for it to see what I could churn out.”
Against a packed Pac-12 field of UCLA, Arizona, Stanford, Cal and Arizona State, Oregon held its own against some of the conference bests. The meet was Oregon’s fourth outdoor competition and second in the refurbished Hayward Field.
Track and field will be back in action next week once again at home for a two-day Oregon Relays meet starting Friday, April 23.
You can view coverage of the other half of the West Coast Classic meet in Tucson here.
Follow Carly on Twitter @carlyebisuya.
