EUGENE – Texas A&M's squad of 26 athletes continues its national championship journey this week. The next stage of the NCAA Championships resumes with the semifinals and finals held Wednesday through Saturday at Hayward Field on the University of Oregon campus. The Aggie men compete on Wednesday and Friday while the women compete on Thursday and Saturday.
"We're taking a lot of people to Eugene, with 26 athletes that's a big group of people," noted Texas A&M head coach Pat Henry. "Now we'll see what this group can do. There's no question we're leaving some points at home through injuries, but you have to deal with it. We've been fortunate in the past, over the years, to be extremely healthy this time of the year. This season, for whatever reason, we've had some issues.
"This is a competitive group and they know what it's all about. They're going into this week with a lot of expectations for themselves. We're going up there with the intention of doing the best that we can."
The Aggie men, nationally ranked No. 5 following the NCAA West preliminary rounds, will have 12 entries from 12 athletes in nine events. The women, nationally ranked No. 6, also have 12 entries from 14 athletes in eight events.
Coverage of the NCAA Championships will be on various ESPN channels. Start times on TV for each day include 6:30 p.m. (CT) on ESPN2 (Wednesday), 6 p.m. on EPSN2 (Thursday), 7:30 p.m. on ESPN (Friday) and 5:30 p.m. on ESPN (Saturday). Earlier coverage online via ESPN3 is available at 2:20 p.m. (Wednesday), 11:50 a.m. (Thursday), 2:20 p.m. (Friday) and 1:20 p.m. (Saturday).
Texas A&M will contest six events in which a pair of Aggies qualified for Eugene. The events include the men's 400m hurdles (Infinite Tucker, Ilolo Izu), pole vault (Jacob Wooten, Audie Wyatt), women's 800m (Jazmine Fray, Sammy Watson), triple jump (Lajarvia Brown, Ciynamon Stevenson), javelin (Kristen Clark, Maddy Stulce) and heptathlon (Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns).
Other individual qualifiers for the men include Jace Comick (100m), Devin Dixon (800m), Alex Riba (1,500m), Tahar Triki (long jump, triple jump), William Petersson (javelin), and Nathan Hite (decathlon). On the women's side the group includes Gittens (long jump) and Serena Brown (discus).
In addition, Texas A&M will have three relays competing with the women's 4x100 (Amber Ivy, Diamond Spaulding, Brenessa Thompson, Julia Madubuike) and 4x400 (Madubuike, Glorilisha Carter, Watson, Fray) along with the men's 4x400 (Bryce Deadmon, Kyree Johnson, Izu, Dixon).
One of the more intriguing semifinal pairings comes in the men's 4x400 where the Aggies are in the same heat as USC and Florida. Indoors the three schools placed 1-2-3, in the order of USC, Texas A&M and Florida, as each bettered the world record that had been set the previous week by Poland during the World Indoor Championships.
With three semifinal heats in the 4x400 relay, the top two teams in each heat automatically advance to the final along with two schools based on time. Others schools in that first heat include Auburn, Mississippi State, Iowa, TCU and Memphis.
Florida has the top time during the outdoor season with a 3:01.00 they set on their home venue during the Florida Relays. USC produced a 3:01.11 to post the top time in the NCAA West, just ahead of Texas A&M's 3:01.23. The Trojans utilized a 43.06 split from Michael Norman on the anchor leg to counter the 44.13 produced by Dixon for the Aggies.
Last year Texas A&M produced the fastest ever time in the NCAA semifinal round as they posted a 2:59.95 to better the 3:00.76 established by another Aggie squad in 2014.
The Aggie women's 4x400, with a season best of 3:29.61, faces a similar tough task as they race in the final semifinal heat with collegiate leaders Kentucky (3:25.99) along with Tennessee (3:28.96), Alabama (3:29.71) and Oregon (3:29.94).
In the 4x100, Texas A&M races in the first semifinal heat along with collegiate record holders LSU, who broke the 2017 record of 42.12 they shared with Oregon by running a 42.05 to win the SEC title. The season best for the Aggies is 43.26 which equals sixth best this season along with Alabama and Arkansas.
Triki, a sophomore from Algeria, is the collegiate leader in the triple jump this season with a mark of 55-5 ¾ (16.91) and he has also qualified in the long jump, where he has a best of 26-1 ½ (7.96). The only Aggie to score in both jumping events at the NCAA Outdoor meet was Julian Reid, who accomplished the feat twice – as a sophomore in 2009 and as a senior in 2011.
Gittens, who produced the best score by a freshman during the collegiate season, ranks second among collegians in the heptathlon with her Aggie school record and Trinidad & Tobago national record of 6,074 points. Burns, who scored a career best of 5,743 as runner-up to Gittens in the SEC meet, ranks 15th among collegians.
Wisconsin's Georgia Ellenwood tops the heptathlon list with a 6,173 total that won the Big 10 title. Kansas State's Nina Schultz ranks third with a 6,018 score, but she also placed second in the Commonwealth Games in April with a tally of 6,133 points.
The best finish in the NCAA heptathlon by a Texas A&M athlete was Daphne Fitzpatrick's fourth place (5,599) in 2011 while the top score by an Aggie in the NCAA meet is 5,913 by Jena Hemann in 2015.
In the women's 800m, the tandem of Jazmine Fray and Sammy Watson seek to become the first ever to score in the event for Texas A&M at the NCAA Outdoor. They currently rank third and fourth among collegians with times of 2:01.18 by Fray and 2:02.20 for Watson.
Fray, the collegiate record holder indoors and Aggie school record holder outdoors, has missed making the NCAA final the previous two seasons. Fray finished fifth in the NCAA Indoor meet back in March. Watson's debut season at Texas A&M has produced a sweep of the SEC titles along with a bronze medal at the NCAA Indoors.
Dixon, a two-time SEC Outdoor champion at 800m, ranks third among collegians this season with his career best of 1:45.62. UTEP's Michael Saruni broke the collegiate record with a 1:43.25 in late April while Isaiah Harris of Penn State has the second best time at 1:45.31.
Last year Dixon finished seventh in the NCAA final while Saruni, who fell early in the race, placed eighth. They will race in the same semifinal heat, where the top finishers plus the next two fastest times advance to the final.
Following a 1-2 finish in the SEC Championships, Aggie pole vaulters Jacob Wooten and Audie Wyatt will contend for points at Hayward Field. Last season both cleared 17-10 ½ (5.45) in Eugene as Wooten tied for fifth and Wyatt placed seventh. Back in 2015, Wyatt finished fourth with an 18-0 ½ (5.50) clearance.
Season best efforts by Wyatt (18-4 ½ | 5.60) and Wooten (17-10 ½ | 5.45) rank them seventh and equal 18th among collegians.
Kristen Clark ranks fourth this season in the javelin with her career best of 184-4 (56.20) while Maddy Stulce has a season best of 173-6 (52.89) and a career best of 181-5 (55.31) from 2017. Stulce and Clark recently finished second and third in the SEC Championships.
The women's javelin has produced 56 points in the NCAA meet for Texas A&M since 1994 along with two champions – Katy Doyle (2004) and Maggie Malone (2016).
Advancing in the men's javelin for the Aggies is William Petersson, who produced a career best of 231-10 (70.66) this season. His father, Stefan, placed twice in the NCAA javelin competing for Texas as he finished fourth as a junior in 1988 and seventh in 1989.
A silver medal performance at in the 400m hurdles at the SEC Championships by Infinite Tucker produced a career best time of 49.46, which ranks seventh among collegians this season. He advanced to Eugene with a 49.99 effort in the NCAA West preliminary rounds while Ilolo Izu ran 50.12 in the same quarterfinal heat. Izu posted a career best of 50.00 earlier this season to claim the Texas Relays title.
The best finish for Texas A&M in the 400m hurdles has been fourth place, achieved by three Aggies – Richard Murphy (1993 – 50.34), Ricky Pfister (1996 – 49.73) and Robert Grant (2016 – 49.62). The lone year for A&M to have two finalist at the NCAA Championships occurred in 1996 when Curt Young finished seventh to join Pfister's fourth place.
Tucker races in the second of three semifinal heats from lane five, with NCAA East leader Kenny Selmon of North Carolina in lane four. Selmon ran 48.91 in the NCAA East meet to rank second among collegians. Izu races in the third semifinal heat from lane six with SEC champion Kemar Mowatt (49.32) in lane four and Michigan's Taylor McLaughlin (49.62), the Big 10 champ, in five.
Having set schools records this year in the indoor mile (3:59.12) and 1,500 outdoors (3:40.66), Alex Riba qualified for the NCAA Outdoor meet a second consecutive year. He will race in the first of two semifinal heats where the top five from each heat, plus next two fastest times, reach the final. Last season Riba clocked 3:44.14 in placing ninth in the semifinal heat, 14th overall as 12 advanced to the final.
A career best and Bahamas national record throw of 198-1 (60.39) in the discus ranks Serena Brown fifth among collegians this season. Brown qualified for her second NCAA Championship with a toss of 176-9 (53.87) during the NCAA West meet. She will be the 12th and last thrower in flight one.
Lajarvia Brown, who placed seventh at NCAA Indoor in the triple jump, ranks eighth among collegians this outdoor season with her career best of 44-6 ¾ (13.58). Ciynamon Stevenson generated a career best of 43-6 (13.26) during the NCAA West meet to reach Eugene.
Nathan Hite ranks 10th in the decathlon with a career best score of 7,723 he produced as a bronze medalist in the SEC Championships. The NCAA field includes Kentucky's Tim Duckworth, the collegiate leader at 8,145, who competed in individual events during the SEC meet.
Jace Comick's 10.33 ranked 22nd in the NCAA West in the 100m, but he is among the 12 sprinters who advanced from Sacramento racing amid the field of 24 in the semifinal heats in Eugene. He ran the time twice in consecutive meets at the SEC Championships and NCAA West while adding a wind-aided 10.27 in the first round of the NCAA West.
Texas A&M Schedule – NCAA Championships – Eugene, Oregon
(times listed in Pacific time)
Wednesday, June 6
Thursday, June 7
Friday, June 8
Saturday, June 9
"We're taking a lot of people to Eugene, with 26 athletes that's a big group of people," noted Texas A&M head coach Pat Henry. "Now we'll see what this group can do. There's no question we're leaving some points at home through injuries, but you have to deal with it. We've been fortunate in the past, over the years, to be extremely healthy this time of the year. This season, for whatever reason, we've had some issues.
"This is a competitive group and they know what it's all about. They're going into this week with a lot of expectations for themselves. We're going up there with the intention of doing the best that we can."
The Aggie men, nationally ranked No. 5 following the NCAA West preliminary rounds, will have 12 entries from 12 athletes in nine events. The women, nationally ranked No. 6, also have 12 entries from 14 athletes in eight events.
Coverage of the NCAA Championships will be on various ESPN channels. Start times on TV for each day include 6:30 p.m. (CT) on ESPN2 (Wednesday), 6 p.m. on EPSN2 (Thursday), 7:30 p.m. on ESPN (Friday) and 5:30 p.m. on ESPN (Saturday). Earlier coverage online via ESPN3 is available at 2:20 p.m. (Wednesday), 11:50 a.m. (Thursday), 2:20 p.m. (Friday) and 1:20 p.m. (Saturday).
Texas A&M will contest six events in which a pair of Aggies qualified for Eugene. The events include the men's 400m hurdles (Infinite Tucker, Ilolo Izu), pole vault (Jacob Wooten, Audie Wyatt), women's 800m (Jazmine Fray, Sammy Watson), triple jump (Lajarvia Brown, Ciynamon Stevenson), javelin (Kristen Clark, Maddy Stulce) and heptathlon (Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns).
Other individual qualifiers for the men include Jace Comick (100m), Devin Dixon (800m), Alex Riba (1,500m), Tahar Triki (long jump, triple jump), William Petersson (javelin), and Nathan Hite (decathlon). On the women's side the group includes Gittens (long jump) and Serena Brown (discus).
In addition, Texas A&M will have three relays competing with the women's 4x100 (Amber Ivy, Diamond Spaulding, Brenessa Thompson, Julia Madubuike) and 4x400 (Madubuike, Glorilisha Carter, Watson, Fray) along with the men's 4x400 (Bryce Deadmon, Kyree Johnson, Izu, Dixon).
One of the more intriguing semifinal pairings comes in the men's 4x400 where the Aggies are in the same heat as USC and Florida. Indoors the three schools placed 1-2-3, in the order of USC, Texas A&M and Florida, as each bettered the world record that had been set the previous week by Poland during the World Indoor Championships.
With three semifinal heats in the 4x400 relay, the top two teams in each heat automatically advance to the final along with two schools based on time. Others schools in that first heat include Auburn, Mississippi State, Iowa, TCU and Memphis.
Florida has the top time during the outdoor season with a 3:01.00 they set on their home venue during the Florida Relays. USC produced a 3:01.11 to post the top time in the NCAA West, just ahead of Texas A&M's 3:01.23. The Trojans utilized a 43.06 split from Michael Norman on the anchor leg to counter the 44.13 produced by Dixon for the Aggies.
Last year Texas A&M produced the fastest ever time in the NCAA semifinal round as they posted a 2:59.95 to better the 3:00.76 established by another Aggie squad in 2014.
The Aggie women's 4x400, with a season best of 3:29.61, faces a similar tough task as they race in the final semifinal heat with collegiate leaders Kentucky (3:25.99) along with Tennessee (3:28.96), Alabama (3:29.71) and Oregon (3:29.94).
In the 4x100, Texas A&M races in the first semifinal heat along with collegiate record holders LSU, who broke the 2017 record of 42.12 they shared with Oregon by running a 42.05 to win the SEC title. The season best for the Aggies is 43.26 which equals sixth best this season along with Alabama and Arkansas.
Triki, a sophomore from Algeria, is the collegiate leader in the triple jump this season with a mark of 55-5 ¾ (16.91) and he has also qualified in the long jump, where he has a best of 26-1 ½ (7.96). The only Aggie to score in both jumping events at the NCAA Outdoor meet was Julian Reid, who accomplished the feat twice – as a sophomore in 2009 and as a senior in 2011.
Gittens, who produced the best score by a freshman during the collegiate season, ranks second among collegians in the heptathlon with her Aggie school record and Trinidad & Tobago national record of 6,074 points. Burns, who scored a career best of 5,743 as runner-up to Gittens in the SEC meet, ranks 15th among collegians.
Wisconsin's Georgia Ellenwood tops the heptathlon list with a 6,173 total that won the Big 10 title. Kansas State's Nina Schultz ranks third with a 6,018 score, but she also placed second in the Commonwealth Games in April with a tally of 6,133 points.
The best finish in the NCAA heptathlon by a Texas A&M athlete was Daphne Fitzpatrick's fourth place (5,599) in 2011 while the top score by an Aggie in the NCAA meet is 5,913 by Jena Hemann in 2015.
In the women's 800m, the tandem of Jazmine Fray and Sammy Watson seek to become the first ever to score in the event for Texas A&M at the NCAA Outdoor. They currently rank third and fourth among collegians with times of 2:01.18 by Fray and 2:02.20 for Watson.
Fray, the collegiate record holder indoors and Aggie school record holder outdoors, has missed making the NCAA final the previous two seasons. Fray finished fifth in the NCAA Indoor meet back in March. Watson's debut season at Texas A&M has produced a sweep of the SEC titles along with a bronze medal at the NCAA Indoors.
Dixon, a two-time SEC Outdoor champion at 800m, ranks third among collegians this season with his career best of 1:45.62. UTEP's Michael Saruni broke the collegiate record with a 1:43.25 in late April while Isaiah Harris of Penn State has the second best time at 1:45.31.
Last year Dixon finished seventh in the NCAA final while Saruni, who fell early in the race, placed eighth. They will race in the same semifinal heat, where the top finishers plus the next two fastest times advance to the final.
Following a 1-2 finish in the SEC Championships, Aggie pole vaulters Jacob Wooten and Audie Wyatt will contend for points at Hayward Field. Last season both cleared 17-10 ½ (5.45) in Eugene as Wooten tied for fifth and Wyatt placed seventh. Back in 2015, Wyatt finished fourth with an 18-0 ½ (5.50) clearance.
Season best efforts by Wyatt (18-4 ½ | 5.60) and Wooten (17-10 ½ | 5.45) rank them seventh and equal 18th among collegians.
Kristen Clark ranks fourth this season in the javelin with her career best of 184-4 (56.20) while Maddy Stulce has a season best of 173-6 (52.89) and a career best of 181-5 (55.31) from 2017. Stulce and Clark recently finished second and third in the SEC Championships.
The women's javelin has produced 56 points in the NCAA meet for Texas A&M since 1994 along with two champions – Katy Doyle (2004) and Maggie Malone (2016).
Advancing in the men's javelin for the Aggies is William Petersson, who produced a career best of 231-10 (70.66) this season. His father, Stefan, placed twice in the NCAA javelin competing for Texas as he finished fourth as a junior in 1988 and seventh in 1989.
A silver medal performance at in the 400m hurdles at the SEC Championships by Infinite Tucker produced a career best time of 49.46, which ranks seventh among collegians this season. He advanced to Eugene with a 49.99 effort in the NCAA West preliminary rounds while Ilolo Izu ran 50.12 in the same quarterfinal heat. Izu posted a career best of 50.00 earlier this season to claim the Texas Relays title.
The best finish for Texas A&M in the 400m hurdles has been fourth place, achieved by three Aggies – Richard Murphy (1993 – 50.34), Ricky Pfister (1996 – 49.73) and Robert Grant (2016 – 49.62). The lone year for A&M to have two finalist at the NCAA Championships occurred in 1996 when Curt Young finished seventh to join Pfister's fourth place.
Tucker races in the second of three semifinal heats from lane five, with NCAA East leader Kenny Selmon of North Carolina in lane four. Selmon ran 48.91 in the NCAA East meet to rank second among collegians. Izu races in the third semifinal heat from lane six with SEC champion Kemar Mowatt (49.32) in lane four and Michigan's Taylor McLaughlin (49.62), the Big 10 champ, in five.
Having set schools records this year in the indoor mile (3:59.12) and 1,500 outdoors (3:40.66), Alex Riba qualified for the NCAA Outdoor meet a second consecutive year. He will race in the first of two semifinal heats where the top five from each heat, plus next two fastest times, reach the final. Last season Riba clocked 3:44.14 in placing ninth in the semifinal heat, 14th overall as 12 advanced to the final.
A career best and Bahamas national record throw of 198-1 (60.39) in the discus ranks Serena Brown fifth among collegians this season. Brown qualified for her second NCAA Championship with a toss of 176-9 (53.87) during the NCAA West meet. She will be the 12th and last thrower in flight one.
Lajarvia Brown, who placed seventh at NCAA Indoor in the triple jump, ranks eighth among collegians this outdoor season with her career best of 44-6 ¾ (13.58). Ciynamon Stevenson generated a career best of 43-6 (13.26) during the NCAA West meet to reach Eugene.
Nathan Hite ranks 10th in the decathlon with a career best score of 7,723 he produced as a bronze medalist in the SEC Championships. The NCAA field includes Kentucky's Tim Duckworth, the collegiate leader at 8,145, who competed in individual events during the SEC meet.
Jace Comick's 10.33 ranked 22nd in the NCAA West in the 100m, but he is among the 12 sprinters who advanced from Sacramento racing amid the field of 24 in the semifinal heats in Eugene. He ran the time twice in consecutive meets at the SEC Championships and NCAA West while adding a wind-aided 10.27 in the first round of the NCAA West.
Texas A&M Schedule – NCAA Championships – Eugene, Oregon
(times listed in Pacific time)
Wednesday, June 6
| 12:30 p.m. | Decathlon | 100m | Nathan Hite | |
| 1:10 p.m. | Decathlon | Long Jump | Nathan Hite | |
| 2:25 p.m. | Decathlon | Shot Put | Nathan Hite | |
| 3:40 p.m. | Decathlon | High Jump | Nathan Hite | |
| 4:46 p.m. | Men | 1,500m | Semifinal | Alex Riba |
| 5:00 p.m. | Men | Pole Vault | FINAL | Audie Wyatt, Jacob Wooten |
| 5:45 p.m. | Men | Javelin | FINAL | Will Petersson |
| 5:46 p.m. | Men | 100m | Semifinal | Jace Comick |
| 6:00 p.m. | Men | Long Jump | FINAL | Tahar Triki |
| 6:14 p.m. | Men | 800m | Semifinal | Devin Dixon |
| 6:30 p.m. | Men | 400 Hurdles | Semifinal | Infinite Tucker, Ilolo Izu |
| 6:56 p.m. | Decathlon | 400m | Nathan Hite | |
| 7:48 p.m. | Men | 4x400 Relay | Semifinal | Texas A&M |
Thursday, June 7
| 10:00 a.m. | Decathlon | 110m Hurdles | Nathan Hite | |
| 10:50 a.m. | Decathlon | Discus | Nathan Hite | |
| 12:00 p.m. | Decathlon | Pole Vault | Nathan Hite | |
| 2:30 p.m. | Decathlon | Javelin | Nathan Hite | |
| 4:02 p.m. | Women | 4x100 Relay | Semifinal | Texas A&M |
| 5:15 p.m. | Women | Javelin | FINAL | Kristen Clark, Maddy Stulce |
| 5:30 p.m. | Women | Long Jump | FINAL | Tyra Gittens |
| 5:44 p.m. | Women | 800m | Semifinal | Jazmine Fray, Sammy Watson |
| 6:26 p.m. | Decathlon | 1,500m | Nathan Hite | |
| 7:18 p.m. | Women | 4x400 Relay | Semifinal | Texas A&M |
Friday, June 8
| 12:30 p.m. | Heptathlon | 100m Hurdles | Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns | |
| 1:30 p.m. | Heptathlon | High Jump | Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns | |
| 3:30 p.m. | Heptathlon | Shot Put | Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns | |
| 5:40 p.m. | Men | Triple Jump | FINAL | Tahar Triki |
| 5:42 p.m. | Men | 1,500m | FINAL | (Alex Riba) |
| 6:22 p.m. | Men | 100m | FINAL | (Jace Comick) |
| 6:44 p.m. | Men | 800m | FINAL | (Devin Dixon) |
| 6:57 p.m. | Men | 400 Hurdles | FINAL | (Infinite Tucker, Ilolo Izu) |
| 7:13 p.m. | Heptathlon | 200m | Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns | |
| 7:51 p.m. | Men | 4x400 Relay | FINAL | (Texas A&M) |
Saturday, June 9
| 11:30 a.m. | Heptathlon | Long Jump | Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns | |
| 12:45 p.m. | Heptathlon | Javelin | Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns | |
| 3:05 p.m. | Women | Discus | FINAL | Serena Brown |
| 3:32 p.m. | Women | 4x100 Relay | FINAL | (Texas A&M) |
| 3:40 p.m. | Women | Triple Jump | FINAL | Lajarvia Brown, Ciynamon Stevenson |
| 4:44 p.m. | Women | 800m | FINAL | (Jazmine Fray, Sammy Watson) |
| 5:13 p.m. | Heptathlon | 800m | Tyra Gittens, Shaina Burns | |
| 5:51 p.m. | Women | 4x 400 Relay | FINAL | (Texas A&M) |