Henry Takes Fourth in Decathlon

NORMAN, Okla. Mitch Henry scored a personal best 7,219 points in the decathlon Thursday to place fourth overall on day two of the 80th Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays.

The Inola, Okla., native's total ranked fifth on OU's all-time performance list and was the best performance by a Sooner since 2001. Henry's total provisionally qualifies for the NCAA National Championships.

Matt O'Connor (6,692) also tallied a personal best to finish 12th as both Sooners improved from their day one standings. Henry was 13th and O'Connor was 15th after five of the ten events Wednesday.

Henry, who was the national junior college decathlon champion last year, made up ground on first-day and overall leader Brandon Buteaux of UT-San Antonio (7,342) to close the gap from 289 to 123 points over the final five events.

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Iowa State's Neil Hines (7,314) and Texas' Andrew Webb (7,226) finished second and third, foreshadowing a tough battle for the Big 12 Championship individual title.

Henry dominated in the discus throw, winning the event by over seven feet with a 144-6 (44.00) toss to score 746 points, 45 more than second place.

O'Connor (15.57) and Henry (15.63) opened the morning with good runs in the 110-meter high hurdles, finishing seventh and ninth, respectively. Henry took fourth in the pole vault and O'Connor was sixth out of the 18 remaining in the field on day two.

Henry was second in the javelin throw, recording a season best of 184-11 (56.37) to ensure a top-five spot before finishing seventh (4:41.20) in the 1,500-meter run, the final event.

Leonarde Smith placed 11th overall in a field of 68 men's 400-meter intermediate hurdlers. Smith clocked a personal best 51.57, an NCAA regional qualifying mark.

The Texas Relays continue through Saturday.

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