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May 25, 2012
NCAA track regional: Today's highlights
Heading to Myers Stadium today for the NCAA West Regional track meet? Here are some notable events to follow:
Women’s pole vault (1 p.m.): Arkansas’ Tina Sutej posted her nation’s-best vault of 14-11 here at the Texas Relays. No. 2-ranked Shade Weygandt of Texas Tech, at 14-9, isn’t far behind.
Women’s high jump (5 p.m.): Arizona’s Brigetta Barrett (6-43/4) is the runaway national leader, but the Longhorns duo of Shanay Briscoe (6-1 1/4) and Victoria Lucas (6-0) are tied for second and sixth, respectively, in the West.
Men’s 110 hurdles (5 p.m.): Illinois’ Andrew Riley ranks first nationally (13.28). Texas’ Keiron Stewart has the region’s fourth-best time (13.46).
Women’s 100 hurdles (5:30 p.m.): Texas’ Morgan Snow, the only freshman among the West’s top-10 best (at No. 6), hopes to continue an outstanding year after posting a career-best 13.14 at the Big 12 meet.
Men’s 200 (8 p.m.): Texas A&M sophomore Prezel Hardy Jr. — from Ellison — is coming off a great Big 12 meet in which he set personal bests in winning the 200 (20.33) and the 100 (10.03). Both are best in the West.
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August 5, 2011
Goodwin places fifth in London
While his former —- and possibly future —- football teammates opened fall two-a-days Friday, Marquise Goodwin warmed up for next week’s World University Games in China by placing fifth in the long jump at the Aviva London Grand Prix.
Goodwin, the junior wide receiver who is taking a redshirt season this fall in order to concentrate on track, jumped 26-3.75 on his fourth attempt. Australia’s Mitchell Watt, the current world leader in the event, finished first at 27-8.75; Great Britain’s Chris Tomlinson (27-2.75) and Greg Rutherford (26-10.5) finished second and third.
Goodwin finished just behind Irving Saladino, the reigning Olympic champion who jumped 26-8.5.
Goodwin will compete in the World University Games in Shenzhen, China from Aug. 12-23, then will compete in the IAAF World Championships in Korea Aug. 27-Sept. 4.
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March 23, 2011
Gay, Wariner will run at the Relays
This year’s Texas Relays will include at least two big names in Olympic champions Tyson Gay and Jeremy Wariner, who will be part of a 1600-meter relay team. They’ll be joined by Reggie Witherspoon and Lionel Larry.
Both Gay and Wariner know the Relays well. In 2004, Wariner was part of the 1600 relay that set the then-meet record (3:00.04). Two years later, in 2006, Gay was part of USA Red’s 400-meter relay that won the invitational event. Back in 2002, he won the 100 (10.35).
Both remain big names in U.S. track and field.
Last year, Gay —- a three-time world champion and the American record holder in the 100 —- handed Jamaica’s Usain Bolt his first loss in the 100 in two years. Wariner, who has won three Olympic golds in the 400 and a pair of 1600 relays, posted the world’s fastest time in the 400 in 2010 (44.13).
The Texas Relays run April 6-9, at Mike A. Myers Stadium.
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May 4, 2010
Women's track jumps 10 poll spots
The Horns’ women’s track team climbed to No. 6 in this week’s national rankings by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.
The Horns were ranked 16th last week. That’s a leap of 10 spots. Talk about a long jump.
It’s the highest that the Horns have been ranked all season. The Big 12 outdoor championships are next week, May 14-16.
Why the big move in the poll? Last weekend, two Horns produced two of the best 400-meter times in the country, with sophomore Angele Cooper’s 52.18 (second-best in the nation) and junior Chantel Malone’s 52.35 (fourth-best) at the Payton Jordan Invite.
Texas A&M is ranked No. 1 this week and Oklahoma is No. 4. Also head of the Horns are No. 2 LSU, No. 3 Oregon and No. 5 Virginia Tech.
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April 1, 2010
Goodwin, Everett scratched from Texas Relays
A Texas spokesman says Longhorns track and field coaches decided this morning to hold Marquise Goodwin and Tevan Everett out of the Texas Relays this weekend as precautionary measures to let them continue to mend from minor injuries.
Goodwin, the Longhorns’ wide receiver in football who was down to compete in the 400 relay and 100-meter dash, is healing from a mild hamstring injury that occurred while long jumping at the New Balance Collegiate Invitational in New York City in early February, the spokesman said.
Everett, the defending NCAA outdoor 800 runner-up who was expected to make his 2010 debut at the Relays in two relay events, is nursing a mild Achilles tendon issue.
Both athletes are expected to return to competition soon, the spokesman said.
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July 31, 2009
Your Big 12 female athlete of the year: Destinee Hooker
Destinee Hooker, the Longhorn star in volleyball and track and field, has been named Big 12 female athlete of the year.
Hooker, who will be a senior this fall, was a first-team All-America selection in volleyball last season as well as NCAA champion in the indoor and outdoor high jumps.
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March 14, 2009
Horns' Hernandez adds another 800 title
Correspondent James Dunaway reports from College Station:
Jacob Hernandez raced through a full day Saturday.
Competing for Texas at the NCAA indoor track and field championships, Hernandez added the men’s 800-meter championship to the outdoor title he won last June at the distance.
Hernandez’s winning time of 1 minute, 48.04 seconds wasn’t especially fast, but it showed off his experience and tactical racing skills. The objective was to beat Oregon’s fast-finishing Andrew Wheating, who chased Hernandez to the finish at the NCAA outdoor meet.
Hernandez followed his teammate Tevan Everett through a fast first 400 meters in 52.5 seconds. For his part, Wheating hung back in fifth.
Hernandez then charged into the lead with a lap-and-a-half to go, opened an eight-meter lead on the field and sprinted the rest of the way. By the time Wheating began his kick, the best he could do was second place, four meters behind Hernandez.
After his victory at Texas A&M’s Gilliam Indoor Track Stadium, Hernandez kept right on running, at least figuratively; he immediately left College Station for Houston to attend his sister’s wedding. But Everett, who finished sixth in 1:49.13, was happy to speak for him.
“We ran a team race,” he said. “I told Jacob if anyone tries to take the lead, I’ll fight him off. I knew if Jacob got in front, he was strong enough to win the race. It wore me out, but in terms of being a team player, I did my job.”
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February 4, 2009
Goodwin signs track scholarship
Two-time junior world champion Marquise Goodwin signed a letter of intent to run track with the Longhorns.
He also was an all-district wide receiver at Garland Rowlett High School.
Goodwin won the junior world title in the long jump last year and also earned a gold medal running the third leg of the 400-meter relay.
He ranked first in the country last year among all high school long jumpers and was sixth in the 100 meters.
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August 15, 2008
Manzano survives to Olympic semifinal
Texas ex and Marble Falls product Leo Manzano ran the second-fastest 1,500 meters of his career to advance to the Olympic semifinals.
Manzano ran a 3:36.67. He told the Houston Chronicle, “That was the best race of my life. I went out and ran my heart out.”
He finished sixth in his heat but was still among the 24 runners who’ll race in the semifinals at 8:55 a.m. Central time Saturday.
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August 6, 2008
Virginia hires UT track assistant Vigilante
Vigilante, a distance specialist, also will serve at the Cavaliers’ cross-country coach.
Vigilante came to Texas as a volunteer assistant for the women’s cross country team. He became a men’s assistant coach in 2000 and in 2005 was promoted to head men’s cross-country coach.
Named the 2008 national indoor assistant coach of the year and the 2005 national outdoor assistant coach of the year, Vigilante led UT’s cross country team to seven appearances in the NCAA championships, with six top-25 finishes.
Vigilante helped turn Manzano into one of the Big 12’s most decorated runners, capped when the Marble Falls product earned a spot on the U.S. Olympic team in the 1,500 meters with a second-place finish at the Olympic Trials. Manzano became the first athlete in Big 12 history to win the mile run at four straight league indoor championships.
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June 23, 2008
Kilmartin wins top academic honor for track
Texas senior Donovan Kilmartin, who balances his graduate studies in petroleum engineering with competing in the decathlon, was named the academic all-American of the year Monday by the College Sports Information Directors of America.
Kilmartin, named an academic All-American for the third consecutive year, was selected for the top academic honor from more than 300 nominations nationwide.
“That is an unbelievable honor,” Kilmartin said in a statement. “I’ve paid attention to the guys on these teams during my career and they are outstanding scholars and athletes. To be chosen as the All-American of the Year out of that group is really special. I’m shocked.
“To me, this is what college is all about. We all come in as athletes trying to make it to the pros, but academics are what carry you through your future careers and life. It was a top priority for me and I’m honored to have been selected for this award.”
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May 13, 2008
10 named to academic men's track team
Ten Longhorns were named Tuesday to the academic all-Big 12 track and field team.
Selected to the first team (3.2 GPA or better) were senior decathlete Donovan Kilmartin, ophomore middle-distance runner Will Schroeder, senior pole valuter Brandon McFarling, senior distance runner Ryan Wilson, junior distance runner Kyle Miller, sophomore combined-events participant Shawn Schmidt and redshirt freshman distance runner Habben Berhane (distance).
Three Longhorns were named to the academic second team (3.0 GPA): senior distance runner Leonel Manzano, junior javelin thrower Dustin Bynum and redshirt freshman distance runner Brandon Birdsong.
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April 26, 2008
Track and field triple play
Victorious in the distance medley relay on Friday, Texas won both the four-mile and 3,200-meter relays on Saturday at the Penn Relays. In the process, Texas became only the fifth school to pull off the distance-running triple at the meet.
The other teams to accomplish the feat are Arkansas (1999), Maryland (1940), Michigan (1945, 2005) and Villanova (11 times between 1964 to 1980).
Longhorn senior Leo Manzano was named the Penn Relays’ outstanding college performer for the second straight year. In each of the past two years, he has anchored both the distance medley and four-mile relays to wins at the relays.
Texas won the 3,200-meter relay Saturday in 7 minutes, 23.51 seconds. LSU placed second in 7:24.42. The Longhorns’ time in the four-mile relay was 16:29.50, just ahead of Virginia (16:31.04).
On Friday, the Longhorns won the distance medley relay for the third straight year at the Penn Relays. Texas covered the legs of 1,200, 400, 800 and 1,600 meters in 9:32.89. Stanford came in second in 9:33.16.
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March 19, 2008
Texas loses track sprinter Bianca Knight
The Texas track team announced today that freshman sprinter Bianca Knight is forgoing the rest of her collegiate career and is turning pro.
Knight was a top junior sprinter who was a budding star on the collegiate scene. Last week, she won the 200 meters last week at the NCAA indoor meet and finished third in the 60 meters.
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Manzano, Vigilante get national honors
Longhorn middle-distance runner Leo Manzano and associate head coach Jason Vigilante have been named national track athlete of the year and national assistant coach of the year by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches’ Association.
The awards follow similar regional awards for the Texas duo from the coaches association.
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March 10, 2008
Manzano honored as top regional track athlete
Texas miler Leo Manzano (a Marble Falls product) was chosen Monday as regional track athlete of the year by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches’ Association.
Texas associate head coach Jason Vigilante, who works with the Longhorn distance runners, was honored as the group’s choice for assistant coach of the year.
Vigilante worked with and Manzano ran on the Longhorn distance-medley relay team that broke five records at the Tyson Invitational.
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March 4, 2008
Thornton gets coaching honor
After his team claimed the Big 12 indoor track and field title, Texas coach Bubba Thornton was chosen by his peers as the conference’s indoor track coach of the year.
Thornton will coach the U.S. men’s track team at the Olympics this summer. But first, he’ll take his team to Arkansas for the NCAA indoors next week.
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February 22, 2008
Kearney honored by Auburn, her alma mater
Longhorn women’s track coach Bev Kearney will don a different shade of orange this weekend as she returns to Auburn University to receive a lifetime achievement award.
At Auburn, Kearney was twice an all-American and qualified for the U.S. Olympic team in the 200 meters. Since then, of course, she’s gone to a Hall of Fame career as a collegiate track coach.
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November 20, 2007
Frederick chosen for track hall of fame
Jane Frederick, a former assistant track coach at the University of Texas, will be inducted into the National Track & Field Hall of Fame.
Frederick won nine national championships in the pentathlon and heptathlon and competed in the 1972 and 1976 Olympics.
She was on Terry Crawford’s staff at UT from 1989-1992 and coached four athletes who won national championships.
Frederick is now a strength and conditioning coach at the University of California Santa Barbara.
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June 26, 2007
Longtime Texas Relays announcer dies
The world of colorful sports personalities has decreased by one. J. Fred Duckett died Monday night.
If the name doesn’t ring a bell, his booming base voice probably does. You longtime Houston Astro sufferers no doubt remember “Jose Cruuuuuuuuz!” when the outfielder came to bat in the Astrodome in the 1970s and ’80s.
That was J. Fred, who was the public-address voice of the Astros from 1969 to 1992. He also did P.A. announcing for the NFL’s Oilers as well as his beloved Owls of Rice, his alma mater. But his first sporting love was track and field. He was a fixture at every major meet in the Southwest, including the Texas Relays, for decades.
Reports say J. Fred had battled leukemia for several months before he died at age 74 in a Houston hospital. It wasn’t apparent the last time I saw him — the rain-plagued final day of the Texas Relays on April 7. Like every other track meet we’d been at over the past 30-something years, we chatted about the sport and its characters, of which he unquestionably was one. J. Fred was a walking, talking (oh, how he could talk) encyclopedia of the sport, an invaluable resource if for some reason you needed to know, say, the time of an obscure steeplechaser at the 1984 Mt. SAC Relays.
But more than his knowledge, J. Fred had a droll, occasionally somewhat subversive sense of humor.
I recall a Southwest Conference indoor championship at Will Rogers Coliseum in Fort Worth sometime in the early 1980s. A false start in a sprint race triggered a barrage of restart pistols echoing through the cavernous old building.
Over the PA system came that big voice: “Sounds like Houston on a Saturday night.”
RIP, old friend. Our track meets will never sound the same again.
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March 15, 2007
Better late than never: Thornton to head Olympic track team
Nearly one year after Bubba Thornton was announced at the Texas Relays as the head men’s track coach for the United States for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, USA Track and Field made its official announcement Thursday.
UCLA women’s coach Jeanette Bolden will be the women’s head coach.
Men’s assistant coaches are Harvey Glance, John McDonnell, Joe Vigil, Irving “Boo” Schexnayder and Criss Somerlot.
Women’s staff nominees are Chandra Cheeseborough, J.J. Clark, Connie Price-Smith, Rita Somerlot and Kim Keenan-Kirkpatrick. Relay coaches are Brooks Johnson and Orin Richburg.
All appointments depend on the final approval of the U.S. Olympic Committee Board of Directors.
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March 12, 2007
Kearney to receive courage award
Bev Kearney, who recovered from a life-threatening car wreck to coach her Longhorn women’s track team to two national championships, is being honored next Monday with a Gene Autrey Courage Award. The ceremony will be in Tempe, Ariz.
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November 28, 2006
Richards pulls in another track honor
Former Longhorn Sanya Richards and former Baylor Bear Jeremy Wariner were named winners of the 2006 Jesse Owens Award by USA Track & Field on Tuesday. Richards and Wariner, her training partner, completed undefeated seasons in the 400 meters, with Richards setting an American record in the process.
The Jesse Owens Award is USA Track & Field’s most prestigious honor and is presented annually to the top male and female performers in the sport.
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November 13, 2006
Ex-Horn Richards named IAAF athlete of the year
Congratulations to Sanya Richards, the former Longhorn track star who on Sunday was named world athlete of the year by the International Association of Athletics Federations, track and field’s governing body. Jamaican sprinter Asafa Powell also received the same recognition.
For the first time, the award came with $100,000 checks for the two athletes. The awards were given out at a gala in Monte Carlo.
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June 19, 2006
Track star Hooker leaves Texas to turn pro
Longhorn track star Marshevet Hooker has turned pro, giving up her final year of college eligibility, according to her manager.
Hooker has signed with Boston-based agent Global Athletics & Marketing, the agency said in a press release.
Hooker just completed her junior season at Texas, where she led the Longhorns to the NCAA outdoor title in 2005 and the indoor title in 2006. A hamstring injury brought an early end to Hooker’s final NCAA meet this month.
She is a nine-time All-American and four-time NCAA champion.
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June 7, 2006
Hooker to miss NCAA meet
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The Texas women’s track team’s hopes of defending its NCAA outdoor crown took a big hit today when the Longhorns decided Marshevet Hooker was not healthy enough to compete and pulled the nine-time All-American from the national meet.
Hooker, who strained her left hamstring May 27 at the NCAA Midwest Regional, was scheduled to compete today in the prelims of the long jump and 400-meter relay.
“We just kind of ran out of time,” UT Coach Bev Kearney said. “When you’re as finely tuned as she is, it’s a challenge physically and emotionally to get back on track.”
A four-time NCAA champion, Hooker is a junior from San Antonio. Kearney said there was a possibility that Hooker would forego her senior season and turn pro, although the two have not have serious discussions about that yet.
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April 26, 2006
Kearney commercial earns Barbara Jordan Award
A television commercial featuring Texas women’s track coach Bev Kearney has won the Barbara Jordan Media Award from the Texas Governor’s Committee on People with Disabilities.
Time Warner Cable’s Austin division is receiving the award todayThurs for its 30-second spot on Kearney, who survived a 2002 car crash and has since led her Longhorn team to two national titles. In the commercial, Kearney talks about her everyday life — including her use of the remote control when watching cable TV.
The Jordan Award is given annually to a media outlet that accurately and positively reports on people with disabilities.
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April 6, 2006
Hardee wins decathlon, breaks collegiate record
Texas senior Trey Hardee broke the seven-year-old collegiate record to claim the decathlon title at the Texas Relays Thursday afternoon.
Hardee initially thought he came up one point short of Tom Pappas’ standard of 8,463 points. But after meet officials scrutinized the times of the event’s four races, an error was discovered that gave Hardee the record. His time in the 100 was .01 faster than originally thought, which added three points to Hardee’s score.
Hardee’s performance is the best in the world this season. It also puts him in eighth place on the all-time U.S. list.
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March 28, 2006
Two-sport Robison named Big 12 men's track athlete of the week
Brian Robison, who throws the shot and the discus on the track team and plays defensive end on the football team, was named Big 12 men’s outdoor track and field athlete of the week for his performance Saturday at the Texas Invitational.
Robison won the shot put and discus titles at the meet, easily topping the NCAA regional qualifying mark in both events — 62-1.75 (18.94m) in the shot put and 190-1 (57.95m) in the discus.
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March 17, 2006
Tower to be lighted Tuesday for track team's title
The UT Tower will be lighted orange with the numeral 1 shining on all four sides on Tuesday March 21 to honor the women’s indoor track team, which won its sixth national championship last weekend.
It will be the second lighting in honor of women’s track in the past year. Last June, Texas won the women’s outdoor track title.
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