UCLA
NCAA West Preliminary Round
Three Bruins Punch Championship Tickets at Regionals
May 24, 2018 | Track & Field
SACRAMENTO, Calif. โ The UCLA track & field teams punched three tickets to the NCAA Championships in Eugene, Ore. and had a pair of runners survive preliminary races on Thursday in the opening day of the NCAA West Regionals hosted at Hornet Stadium by Sacramento State.
After the day's events, UCLA heptathlete Kendall Gustafson โ who qualified for the NCAA Championships with a No. 2 finish at the Pac-12 Combined Events Championships โ will have Bruin company in Eugene in junior Justin Stafford (men's hammer), freshman Alyssa Wilson (women's shot put) and junior Robert Brandt (10,000m). The Championships will run from Jun. 6-9.
As has been the case for the majority of the year, Stafford got the Bruins off to a good start for the day with a solid showing in the men's hammer, locking down a spot in the NCAA Championships with a mark of 64.65m (212-01) on his third attempt. This marks Stafford's first entry into the NCAA Championships after qualifying for Regionals in each of the last two seasons.
The Bruins punched their second ticket to Eugene for the day in the women's shot put, as Wilson shook off a first-throw foul to record a 16.22m (52-3.5) launch on her second attempt. Good enough for sixth at the time of the throw, it ended up as the No. 10 mark for the contest.
Wilson will have the opportunity to qualify for the NCAA Championships again on both Friday and Saturday, as she is set to compete in the hammer and discus, respectively. She enters competition as the No. 7 seed in the hammer throw and the No. 13 seed in the discus, giving her a strong chance to become UCLA's first female student-athlete to qualify for multiple individual NCAA Championships since 2007.
Junior Ashlie Blake narrowly missed out on giving UCLA two NCAA Championships entrants in the women's shot put, coming in just outside the top-12 with a throw of 15.93m (52-3.25, 16th place).
UCLA's final NCAA Championships qualifier came in the men's 10,000m in what turned out to be one of the most exciting events of the night. The competing Bruin duo, Brandt and senior Myles Smith, came out with an aggressive race plan and found themselves at the front of the pack setting the tempo for a majority of the race. Brandt and Smith were 1-2 through the halfway point of the event, after which Brandt surged ahead and separated himself from the pack.
Brandt created a sizable gap between himself and the rest of the field during the second half of the race, a period in which he led all the way up to the 25th and final lap. On the home stretch of the last lap, the rest of the pack made a mad dash for the finish line resulting in Brandt finishing eighth at 29:15.57 โ his second-best 10K time this season โ and clinching a spot at the NCAA Championships.
Smith meanwhile came in 33rd at 30:08.44, ending his season and capping off his UCLA career with a gutsy performance in his second Regional appearance.
At the time he finished his turn in the men's 400m prelims, senior Joe Herrera's time of 47.02 qualified him to advance to Friday's quarterfinal (top three from each of the six heats, plus six next-best times qualify), though the Bruins had to sweat it out as three heats followed Herrera. Eventually, his 20th place finish held up and ensured him a spot in Friday's race and represented a 14-spot improvement on his seed entering the week.
Sophomore Riley Kelly secured a qualifying spot in his own preliminary race, taking one of the six non-auto-qualifying positions with a No. 18 finish (1:50.42) in the men's 800m, a seven-place improvement on his seed coming into the week. He will compete for one of the 12 spots to the NCAA Championships tomorrow night in the 800m quarterfinals.
In one of the first events of the day, freshman Ilaria Casarotto earned a No. 23 finish in the women's javelin, coming in with a top mark of 45.25m (148-5). The Vicenza, Italy native had a qualifying top-12 mark at the end of second flight, but was passed in the third and final flight.ย
In the men's 1500m run prelims, sophomore Carter Blunt was UCLA's top finisher with a time of 3:53.39. He narrowly missed out on advancing into Saturday's 1500m semifinal (top-five finishers in each heat automatically advance) as he came in just .43 seconds behind the fifth-place runner, Daniel Hintz of Wyoming. Millen Trujillo also completed the 1500m, coming in 47th at 4:06.80.
Freshman Christina Rice capped the day's competition in the women's 10,000m, setting a new collegiate-best at 34:14.42, which was good for 34th place.ย
The Bruins are poised to compete in seven events on Friday. UCLA opens with field competition in the women's discus and pole vault at 4:30 p.m. before starting track competition with the women's 100m hurdles at 5:00 p.m. The Bruins wrap up regional action on Saturday.ย
Stay tuned to @UCLATrack_Field on Twitter for live updates of Regional results.
Players Mentioned
