It was an up-and-down weekend for Oregon at the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships. Going into the meet in Fayetteville, Ark., the Ducks were hoping to score top-10 finishes from both the men and the women, but a series of near misses left the men tied for 19th (11 points) and the women tied for 62nd (0.33 points).
The high point of the meet for the Ducks was the performance of A.J. Acosta in the men’s mile. The sophomore, who had the fastest qualifying time in the field, ran a strong race, never falling below second place until the very end, when Texas’ Jake Morse edged past him, bumping him to third, 4:04.88 to 4:04.90. The Longhorns’ Leonel Manzano, the defending champion, won in 4:04.45.
“A.J. ran a very impressive race, he ran like a veteran,” associate head coach Dan Steele said in a media release. “He ran a smart race but wasn’t able to outkick the Texas kids at the end. He didn’t give anything away to them, he just got beat.”
Ashton Eaton bounced back from a rough first day in the heptathlon, which left him sitting in 12th place, to finish sixth with 5,676 points. Eaton struggled with the shot put and the high jump on Friday, but recovered to post season-best marks in the 60m hurdles, pole vault and 1,000m Saturday.
“It is really hard to bounce back from a tough day like Ashton went through Friday,” Steele said. “I was really proud of his effort and he certainly showed a lot of character coming back from 12th place to capture sixth.”
The men’s other points came from the 4×400 relay team’s seventh-place finish. The quartet of Eaton, Chad Barlow, Phil Alexander and Marcus Dillon scored two points with their time of 3:07.89.
Unable to crack the top eight were Michael McGrath, who finished one spot away from qualifying for the finals in the mile, and the distance medley relay team, which was ninth in 9:36.80, less than half a second behind eighth-place Villanova.
The women had similar fortunes, as hoped-for points from Alex Kosinski, Nicole Blood and the distance medley team failed to materialize. The only scoring for the women came from freshman Melissa Gergel, who finished in a three-way tie for eighth in the pole vault at 13 feet, 5.25 inches. That earned the Ducks one-third of a point.
Gergel, who had the 12th best jump entering the meet, impressed her coaches.
“Any time you come into your first national championships and are able to come away with All-America honors, that’s impressive,” Steele said.
Keshia Baker, a late addition to the meet, ran a strong preliminary heat in the 400m, completing the two laps in 53.79, but finished less than 0.2 seconds away from qualifying for the finals.
Kosinski also came up short in her preliminary heat in the mile. The freshman ran a strong first half of the race, but ultimately finished 12th, two places away from qualifying for the finals.
After keeping with the leaders for the first two-thirds of the 3,000m, Blood struggled in the final kilometer, falling from fourth place to 14th. She crossed the line in 9:38.04, well off of her 9:08.44 personal best.
Like the men’s distance medley squad, the women’s team also finished in ninth place, one spot shy of scoring points.
The Arizona State men and women both captured the team titles. For the Sun Devil women, it is their second indoor title in a row. They also won the 2007 outdoor NCAA championship.
The Ducks next compete this Saturday at the Oregon Preview, at which Hayward Field will be unveiled for the first time since it closed to undergo extensive upgrades in preparation for the upcoming Olympic Trials this summer.
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