Six Sooners Head to NCAAs

March 13, 2008

NORMAN, Okla. -- The Oklahoma indoor track team returns to Fayetteville, Ark., for the 2008 NCAA Indoor Track & Field Championships. The event, hosted by the University of Arkansas, will consist of two days of competition on Friday and Saturday.

Six Sooners, four men and two women, will compete in five different events in hopes of becoming Oklahoma's latest national champion.

Shardae Boutte (triple jump) is Oklahoma's only automatic qualifier with the nation's top mark of the season of 54 feet and one inch (16.48 meters), an OU program record.

Boutte will be joined by five provisional qualifiers including teammate Tydree Lewis in the triple jump.

SCHEDULE | LIVE RESULTS | NOTES

Marcus Pugh (60-meter dash) and Sheldon Leith (60-meter hurdles) round out the Oklahoma men's contingent.

The Sooner women are represented by Latoya Greaves in the 60-meter hurdles and Leslie Cole in the 400-meter dash.

Action begins Friday at 9:45 a.m. with the 60-meter dash portion of the men's heptathlon. Leith will be Oklahoma's first competitor in the men's 60-meter hurdles at 5:05 p.m. on Friday. Saturday's action begins at 11 a.m. with the men's heptathlon 60-meter hurdles.

RESULTS
Live results for the 2008 NCAA Indoor Track & Field Championships will be available at Hogwired.com and LadyBacks.com. A complete recap of Oklahoma action will be posted on SoonerSports.com shortly after the conclusion of action each day.

SOONER(S) TO WATCH
Oklahoma's best chance for an NCAA individual national title comes in the triple jump.

With two of the nation's top-eight triple jumpers in Shardae Boutte (No. 1) and Tydree Lewis (No. 8), the Oklahoma program stands to be the nation's best in the event following the national championships.

The Tyson Track Center is a comfortable venue for the duo as both have recorded season-best jumps under its roof.

LAST YEAR AT THE NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS
University of Oklahoma pole vaulter Chip Heuser repeated as an All-American and OU's women's distance medley relay won the honor for the first time at the 2007 NCAA National Indoor Track & Field Championships.

Heuser finished fourth overall at the Randal Tyson Track Center, clearing 17 feet, 8.75 inches (5.40 meters) to earn his second straight indoor All-America selection and third overall.

Heuser improved on his fifth place finish at last year's NCAA Indoor Championships.

Three vaulters cleared 17-8.75 (5.40) but failed on the next height of 18-0.50 (5.50). Brad Gebauer of McNeese State won the national title on number of attempts. Rory Quiller (SUNY-Binghamton) and Tyson Byers (Washington State) were second and third.

The OU women's distance medley relay broke the school record once again en route to its All-America finish, the first ever for the Sooner relay at the NCAA Championships.

Catherine Odell, Leslie Cole, Kristi Cook and Jessica Eldridge combined to run the 4000-meter relay in 11:13.48, shaving half-a-second off the relay's previous best en route to sixth place overall.

North Carolina won the national title with a run of 10:59.46, an American record.

Portia Nash was 11th in the women's long jump with a best leap of 20-0.50 (6.11) and was later named an All-American after the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association awarded the honor to the top eight finishers and extended it further to displace
non-U.S. citizens

Frankie Wright was 12th in the men's long jump at 24-5.00 (7.44).

Yolanda Goff was 15th in the women's 60-meter dash at 7.39.

Sheldon Leith finished 16th in the men's 60-meter hurdles with a run of 7.89.

LEITH ENJOYING BREAKOUT SEASON
With his 60-meter hurdles win at the New Balance Collegiate Invitational on Feb. 8, senior hurdler Sheldon Leith recorded his fourth win of the season in the event.

Currently ranked sixth in the nation, Leith is the top-ranked hurdler in the Big 12 Conference, with an NCAA provisional qualifying mark of 7.73, an Oklahoma school record.

In this weekend's competition Leith will face off against Big 12 champion Shawon Harris of Texas Tech as the only other Big 12 athletes in the event. Harris is ranked ninth with a time of 7.77.

Jangy Addy of Tennessee is the nation's top-ranked hurdler with a time of 7.67.

RECORDS FALLING
The 2008 indoor season has been a successful one so far for the University of Oklahoma track and field team. One look at the OU record books proves the point.

Five new records have been posted in the 2008 indoor season, four on the men's side and one on the women's.

The men's distance medley relay team started the trend at the Razorback Invitational when it finished second to host Arkansas, but posted a time of 9:42.35. The quartet of Tony Clement, Zach Dawson, Brayon Brown and Rob Sorrell bested the previous mark of 9:42.88 set in 2007 by Brown, Sorrell, Logan Jones and Frankie Wright.

One week later at the J.D. Martin Invitational, one of the most recent additions to the Sooner family, mid-year transfer Mikaela Johansson finished third in the weight throw with a top mark of 54-9.25 (16.69). Johansson's throw bested Katie Webster's previous record of 52-8.00 (16.05), set in 2000.

Since that time, Johansson has continued to add to her program record, reaching the current mark of 55-1.00 (16.79) set at the Big 12 Championships.

New York City was the site of the most impressive weekend as far as Oklahoma record books are concerned. Sheldon Leith and Rob Sorrell both placed their names atop the list in their respective events.

Leith kick-started the weekend on the first day of competition in the 60-meter hurdles. After finishing third in the prelims, Leith claimed the title with a blazing finish of 7.73 in the finals, setting a school record, a mark he had previously held at 7.79 with former Sooner Jason Stanley (2000).

Sorrell made the next claim to fame in the Sooner record book in the mile run at the New Balance Collegiate Invitational. Sorrell's run of 4:03.66 topped Salah Hussein's previous mark of 4:04.64 in 2004.

Shardae Boutte was the fifth Sooner to claim an OU record, posting the nation's longest triple jump and Oklahoma's top mark in history with a jump of 16.48 at the Tyson Invitational.

COLE CLOSES STRONG
In closing the indoor season, Leslie Cole literally made a run to the finish in the 400-meter dash.

After a decent early season in the event, Cole continued to improve towards the end of the season, continually posting faster times each meet.

Cole posted NCAA provisional qualifying times in both the prelims (53.53) and finals (53.48) at the Big 12 Championships en route to a third-place finish in the event.

One week later at a Last Chance Qualifier in Ames, Iowa, Cole ran a time of 53.44, just behind the Oklahoma school record of 53.42.

Cole enters the NCAA Championships ranked 15th nationally. Alabama's Trish Bartholomew is ranked first with a time of 52.10.

BOUTTE NATION'S BEST IN TRIPLE JUMP
The 2008 season has been plentiful for senior horizontal jumper Shardae Boutte. Boutte enters this weekend as the nation's best triple jumper. Entering the weekend, Boutte has also claimed four individual event titles in either the long jump or triple jump.

The 2007 Big 12 outdoor champion in the triple jump, Boutte opened the year with a strong start in the long jump at the Arkansas Invitational, besting his previous personal record by more than eight inches, jumping 24 feet and 11.75 inches (7.61 meters).

The Razorback Invitational was the site of Boutte's next win as he claimed the triple jump title with an NCAA automatic qualifying jump of 52-11.50 (16.14), a mark more than 10 inches longer than teammate Tydree Lewis' second-place finish.

In front of a home crowd as the Mosier Indoor Facility, Boutte took it one step farther, sweeping the triple and long jumps at the J.D. Martin Invitational. It marked the second consecutive year that Boutte won the triple jump in the J.D. Martin Invitational.

Boutte's jump of 24 feet and 2.25 inches (7.37 meters) was good for first in the long jump while his top triple jump of 51-10.50 (15.81) bested OU's Tydree Lewis, who finished second with a jump of 51-1.00 (15.57), by more than nine inches. It was the second straight meet for Boutte and Lewis to finish 1-2 to in the event after doing so at the Razorback Invitational.

A return to the Tyson Track Complex in Fayetteville, Ark., for the 2008 Tyson Invitational boosted Boutte to the top of the OU record books.

A top jump of 54-1.00 (16.48) sent Boutte to top of the nation's performance list and solidified his intentions to capture the NCAA crown in the event.

After taking a weekend off at the Sooner Indoor Open, Boutte returned with a bang the following week at the Big 12 Championships.

LATOYA GREAVES: DIVISION ONE VERSION
After transferring to OU from the NAIA level at Oklahoma Baptist University, Latoya Greaves has quickly established herself as one of the top athletes in the Big 12 Conference.

At OBU, Greaves swept the 2006 NAIA hurdles titles, winning both the 60-meter indoor hurdles and the 100-meter outdoor hurdles.

Greaves posted the second-fastest 60-meter hurdles time, 8.21, in Oklahoma school history at the Big 12 Championships to claim the individual title in the event.

The 60-meter hurdles is not the only event that Greaves has made an impression on, running the second leg on the program's 4x400-relay team that finished fourth in the conference with the seventh-fastest time in program history, 3:41.24.

Greaves enters the NCAA Championships ranked 11th-nationally. Texas A&M's Jennifer Williams (No. 14) is the only other competitor from the Big 12 Conference to advance.

Virginia Tech's Kristi Castlin is the ranked first with a time of 8.01.

CLEMENT CATCHES ON
For someone who didn't begin running distance until the spring of his senior year of high school, Tony Clement is certainly catching on to the sport on the Division I level.

The former high school football player and junior college transfer from Hagerstown (Md.) Community College, Clement has quickly ascended to the top of the Big 12 rankings in the middle distances.

Currently ranked No. 1 in the conference in the 1,000-meter run and No. 3 in the 800-meter run, Clement's times rank No. 2 and No. 4 in the Oklahoma all-time record books. Clement was also a part of the distance medley relay team that broke the OU school record and is currently ranked second in the Big 12.

BOUTTE BIG 12 ATHLETE OF THE WEEK
Oklahoma's Shardae Boutte was named the Co-Big 12 Men's Track and Field Athlete of the Week by the conference office on Jan. 29.

Boutte shared the honor with James Galvan of Iowa State after claiming the triple jump title in the Arkansas Invitational. Boutte's jump of 52 feet and 11.5 inches (16.14 meters) earned him an automatic qualification in the 2008 NCAA Indoor National Championships.

Boutte had previously received the honor during the 2007 outdoor season after bounding 52 feet, 1.75 inches (15.89 meters), then a personal best, in the triple jump at the Arkansas Twilight.

Galvan shared the honor with Boutte after breaking the Iowa State program record in the 800-meter run with a time of one minute and 48.36 seconds, the fastest in the nation. Sally Kipyego of Texas Tech recieved the women's honor after posting the nation's fastest collegiate time in the 10,000 meters, 9:05.45, at the Reebok Boston Indoor Games.

NINETY-THREE TOP-THREE MARKS
Through the 2008 indoor track & field season, 34 University of Oklahoma individual athletes and two relays have accounted for 93 top-three finishes including 27 first-place finishes.

Shardae Boutte leads all Sooners with six top-three finishes, including five first-place finishes each. On the women's side, Leslie Cole and Latoya Greaves lead with five top-three finishes, including two wins by Greaves.

Tony Clement, Sheldon Leith and Marcus Pugh all have five top-three finishes with Leith claiming four titles to Pugh's two and Clement's one. Four Sooner menhave three top-three finishes while four others have two top-three finishes.

On the women's side Mikaela Johansson, Katherine Johnson and Scottesha Miller all have four top-three finishes apiece. Greaves, Johansson and Miller lead the Oklahoma women with two individual titles each.

FAYETTEVILLE IS FAMILIAR
The Randal Tyson Track Center is becoming an awfully familiar location for the Oklahoma indoor track & field team. OU opened 2008 on Jan. 11 with the Arkansas Invitational and returned two weeks later for the Razorback Invitational.

The Tyson Invitational on Feb. 15-16 marked the third trip of the year. Last weekend's NCAA Last Chance Qualifier marked the fourth time of the season for Sooners to travel to Northwest Arkansas.

Now Fayetteville is also the site of the biggest weekend of the collegiate indoor track and field season, the NCAA Indoor National Championships.

On top of the indoor season, OU will travel to Fayetteville twice during the outdoor season for the John McDonnell Invitational (April 18-19) and the Arkansas Twilight (May 2).

LAST WEEK (Big 12 Championships)
Shardae Boutte and Latoya Greaves highlighted competition for Oklahoma at the 2008 Big 12 Indoor Track and Field Championships with individual titles as the Sooner men finished sixth and the women seventh. In all Oklahoma ended with 11 top-three finishes and 38 All-Big 12 performers at the Bob DeVaney Track Center.

Boutte, who is ranked No. 1 in the nation in the triple jump, posted his second NCAA automatic qualifying mark of the season with a top jump of 52 feet and 10 inches (16.10 meters). Teammate Tydree Lewis teamed with Boutte for the duo's third 1-2 finish of the season in the event. Lewis tied a personal best with a jump of 52-7.25 (16.03).

Greaves entered the meet ranked second in the Big 12 and 15th in the nation in the 60-meter hurdles with a previous best time of 8.27. The sophomore from Kingston, Jamaica claimed the event title with an NCAA provisional qualifying mark of 8.21.

Alesha Peel holds the Oklahoma school record in the event with a time of 8.19, set in 2001.

Tony Clement took silver in the men's 1000-meter run with a time of 2:27.51 as two Sooners picked up top-five finishes in the event. Jacob Boone finished fifth with a time of 2:29.47.

Katherine Johnson posted a season-best mark of 5-8.00 (1.73) in the high jump en route to a second-place finish.

Leslie Cole took third in the women's 400-meter dash with an NCAA provisional qualifying time of 53.48. It was the second straight day for Cole to post a provisional mark after running 53.53 in Friday's prelims. The time is the second fastest in school history, behind Wendy Watson's 53.42 run in 1990.

Senior Kristi Cook recorded a time of 2:12.23 to finish third in the women's 800-meter run while Brayon Brown (1:52.97) finished fifth in the men's 800.

Tijahnni Newton claimed third in the women's 600-yard run with a season-best time of 1:21.46. Amanda Mayfield took 6th with a time of 1:24.12.

Marcus Pugh, who entered the meet as the defending conference champion in the 60-meter dash, finished fourth in the event with an NCAA provisional qualifying time of 6.73. Scottesha Miller also ran an NCAA provisional qualifying time, 7.44, finishing seventh in the women's 60-meter dash.

Pugh also took third in the 200-meter dash with an NCAA provisional qualifying time of 21.15.

Mitch Henry and Jamie Alexander both set personal bests in the heptathlon. Henry's 5,438 points was good for sixth while Alexander finished 11th with 5,006 points. With his total, Henry recorded an NCAA provisional mark in the event for the second time this season.

Scottesha Miller medaled in the women's long jump, finishing third. Miller recorded a top jump of 19 feet and six inches (5.94 meters) to capture the bronze behind Nebraska's Chantae McMillan (19-2.00/5.84) and Missouri's Kaela Rorvig (19-0.00/5.79).

Tony Clement, Zach Dawson, Brayon Brown and Rob Sorrell claimed the another Oklahoma bronze, finishing third in the men's distance medley relay with a time of 9:59.70. The women's DMR composed of Kristi Cook, Jalesa Walker, Amanda Mayfield and Kelly Waters finished fifth with a time of 11:38.16.

COMING UP NEXT WEEK
The OU Track and Field program opens the outdoor season with a trip up the Turner Turnpike to Tulsa for the Tulsa Duels on Saturday, March 22.

Action kicks off Saturday morning at 9:30 a.m. with the women's javelin. Running events begin at 1:30 p.m. as the men's 2,000-meter steeplechase takes to the track.

University of Oklahoma Athletics

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