Women's Track & Field Wins First Big 12 Title
Feb 24, 2007 | Track and Field
AMES, Iowa- Texas A&M women's first ever conference title in track and field was achieved in commanding fashion during the second day of the Big 12 Indoor Championships at the Lied Recreation Athletic Center.
Surging to the team lead with a combination of 92 points from five events the Aggie women totaled 141 points to capture its first league title in the history of the program.
Defending champion Texas was runner-up with 104 points. It was the first time in the 11-year history of the Big 12 meet another team besides Texas or Nebraska won the women's championship trophy.
The rest of the women's field included Texas Tech (93), Oklahoma (74.5), Nebraska (69.5), Kansas (52), Missouri (51), Baylor (49), Iowa State (46), Kansas State (44), Colorado (14), and Oklahoma State (2).
By the time the A&M women scored 25 points in the 200 alone, they had already garnered a pair of 19-point efforts in the 60 and 400, along with 18 points in the triple jump and 11 more from the 60 hurdles.
"This is a young group of people that has good talent and everybody stayed on the same page," noted Aggie head coach Pat Henry. "We did everything we could do right and then we did a few things a little better than we thought we could do.
"I can't be any more pleased with some of the performances that we had today, because they surpassed what we actually thought they would do. But over and above everything else, it takes everybody to be successful here. We had a really good team effort."
The men's effort was highlighted by a winning triple jump performance from freshman Zuheir Sharif, who came into the Big 12 meet ranked fourth from season marks. Establishing a lifetime best of 52-1 ¼ (15.88) Sharif became the No. 5 performer on the Aggie indoor list when he set the mark in the second round.
Sharif bettered the two-time defending champion in the event, Nebraska's Daniel Roper, and became only the second Aggie to nab the triple jump title, with the previous A&M winner being Bashir Ramzy in 2001. Roper was runner-up with a mark of 51-8 ¼ (15.75).
Texas A&M men scored 50 points to place ninth in the team scoring. Nebraska and Texas tied for the team championship with 93 points apiece. Following were Oklahoma (80.5), Missouri (79), Baylor (75), Texas Tech (70.5), Kansas (57), Colorado (51), A&M, Iowa State (43) and Kansas State (30).
Yasmine Regis and Clora Williams defended titles they claimed a year ago in the triple jump and 400 meters, respectively, while Simone Facey reset her school record in becoming A&M's first Big 12 champion in the 200.
In addition A&M recorded three runner-up efforts in the meet from Kasey Onwuchekwa in the shot put, Porscha Lucas in the 200 and Ashika Charan in Friday's long jump.
In delivering a 1-2 finish in the 200, Facey and Lucas both set impressive indoor career bests with times of 23.26 and 23.37, respectively, while defeating 60-meter winner Alexandria Anderson of Texas (23.63).
Facey lowered the A&M school record of 23.40 she set earlier this season while Lucas moved to No. 2 on the indoor list. Facey also achieved an NCAA automatic time with her performance.
The personal bests continued in the 200 with a 5-7-8 Aggie finish from Khrystal Carter (23.79, No. 3 performer), Elizabeth Adeoti (23.83, No. 4 performer) and Tresha Henry (23.90).
After 11 points in the 60 hurdles moved Texas A&M into third place, the Aggie women churned out 19 points in the 60 meters to take the lead by a six-point cushion (53-47) over Texas Tech.
Then 18 points were accumulated by four Aggies in the triple jump, pushing the A&M lead to 24 points. A runner-up effort in the shot put added eight more points to the first-place tally, which topped out at 79 points before the women's 400 was contested.
Prior to the 400 and 200 meters, Texas moved within 18 points of the Aggie women. However, the gap in points became bigger once again with another 19 points from A&M from the quarter-mile. The Aggies led by 36 points at that stage, 98-62, over the Longhorns.
Following the 25-point combination in the 200, A&M's total escalated to 123 points with Texas trailing at 86. With a win in the 4 x 400 relay, the Aggies finished off the championship drive with a 37-point victory, the fourth largest in Big 12 history.
Regis, who became the fourth double indoor champion in the Big 12, led the triple jump from a third round mark of 43-4 ½ (13.22), which was a career best, and improved to a personal best of 43-6 ½ (13.27) in securing the victory. Regis now trails the A&M school record held by Detrich Clariett by one-and-a-quarter inch.
Claiming points in the triple jump behind the win for Regis were Ashika Charan in fifth place (42-8 ¼), Crystal McBrady in sixth (41-7 ¼) and Ashley McCarty in eighth (41-0 ¼).
Charan set a career best in moving to No. 3 on the Aggie indoor list with the seventh best performance while McBrady went to No. 5 performer with her personal best.
Clora Williams repeated her performance from a year ago as she defended her championship in the 400 with a time of 53.57. Williams became the third double 400 champ at the conference indoor meet.
Baker was runner-up to Williams in the second heat of the split-section final, but a collision on the final curve of the race slowed her down a bit. She finished with a time of 55.35, which left her in fifth place behind teammate Sandy Wooten, who was third in heat one with a 55.31 and placed fourth overall.
The Aggies dominance in the sprints started with the 60 as Simone Facey led the charge with a runner-up in the shorter dash at 7.32 seconds. Placing in the 60 for A&M included Lucas in fourth (7.40), Carter in sixth (7.43 PR, No. 3 performer), Adeoti in seventh (7.45 PR, No. 4 performer) and Baker in eighth (7.61).
Jennifer Williams clocked 8.37 for second place in the 60 hurdles while Henry claimed three points with a sixth-place finish in career best 8.55, No. 9 A&M performer.
The 1,600-meter relay capped the championship day with a winning time of 3:34.87 ahead of Texas (3:36.24) and Baylor (3:38.54). The Aggie foursome included Tresha Henry, Clora Williams, Sandy Wooten and Katie Baker.
Additional points for the A&M women came from Caroline Wolf and Merideth Snow. Wolf placed third in the high jump with a clearance of 6-0 while Snow finished seventh in the 3,000 meters with a time of 9:47.21, the 10th best performance on the A&M indoor list.
Sarah Ravenelle, who anchored the women's distance medley to a point on Friday, just missed adding a point when she was ninth in the 3,000 meters, running a personal best 9:47.49. She improved to the No. 3 performer with the 11th best performance.
In the men's 4 x 400 relay Texas A&M challenged Baylor as they claimed second with a time of 3:07.17 behind the 3:04.97 from the Bears. Running for the Aggies were Bryant McCombs, A.C. Robinson, Justin McQueen and Justin Oliver.
The A&M men also received a third-place effort from Chris Dykes in the 200 as he won the first heat of the two-section final in an indoor best of 20.99, making him the No. 4 performer with the sixth-best performance on the Aggie all-time list.
Oliver posted a 46.77 in the first heat of the split-section 400 final and it held up for fourth place while Robinson posted a 47.02 for fifth place.
Also producing a 4-5 finish were Tyler Custis and Javier Olivas in the shot put with marks of 56-8 ¾ and 56-6 3/4, respectively. Nick Toohey added a point with an eighth-place finish in the 800 as he clocked 1:54.24.
