Clauson, Yorks, Meyers Complete NCAA Squad

Saturday, May 30

Austin, TX

All Day

University of Washington

NCAA Regionals (West)

Photo by: Washington Athletics

May 31, 2015 | Track & Field

By: Washington Athletics

Complete Results

AUSTIN, Texas – Three more Husky athletes extended their seasons to the sport's biggest stage today as the NCAA West Preliminary Championships came to a close at Mike A. Myers Stadium. Izaic Yorks and Maddie Meyers continued their brilliant track seasons by moving on to the NCAA final site, while junior Curtis Clauson tossed a massive career-best in the javelin to earn his first national championship bid.

From fields of 48 athletes in every event, the final 12 individuals and relays from the western half of the NCAA have been determined, with seven Huskies total moving on from Austin to the next rounds in Eugene where the NCAA Outdoor Championships will run from June 10-13. Along with the three Dawgs moving through today, yesterday saw Baylee Mires, Kristina Owsinski, Meron Simon, and Gianna Woodruff all advance. Were it not for several near misses today the final group for Eugene could have been much larger, as seven individuals or relays finished between 13^th and 18^th overall just today.

The day opened with a bolt from Clauson, well before the lightning descended on the area and forced a long delay. The fourth thrower in the second flight of 16, Clauson launched the javelin on a perfectly arced flight to land just inside the 240-foot line. The mark flashed up on the board as 72.75 meters, or 238-feet, 8-inches. That was a career-best by more than 12 feet, way past the 225-3 mark that Clauson threw just two weeks ago at Pac-12s to finish third, which at the time was itself a PR of nearly seven feet. So over the past two meets, the junior has upped his PR from 218-6 to 238-8. Clauson's second throw was also the second-best of his career, as it went 227-3.

A few technical improvements over the course of the season have paid off at just the right time, said Clauson. “I've been working on just following through the throw,” he said. “In the past I've been amped up and sitting but not following through as well. The focus for this meet was just being really warmed up for those first throws, because three is all you get this year. I wanted the first throw to be the best, my warm-ups felt good and it worked out. I could tell it was a good flight; I knew I caught it. I didn't know it was 72-high, but I knew it was a 70-meter throw.”

The moment was a huge one for a Husky javelin group that has been dealt hard injury luck this season, with returning First Team All-American Quinn Hale missing the season along with two-time All-America honorable mention Carson Fuller. It was redemption as well for Clauson, who was bumped from 12^th to 13^th in the final round of throws at West Prelims a year ago. Clauson also jumped up to a tie for fifth on the UW top-10 list with Troy Burkholder. He becomes the sixth different Dawg to reach NCAAs in the men's javelin over the past five years.

Junior Izaic Yorks ran a very savvy 1,500-meter race to move on to the next round in Oregon, as he finished third in his quarterfinal in 3:42.99. The Pac-12 Champion settled right up front, and led for the middle two laps, before going into the bell lap in second place. Yorks held strong over the final kick to the finish, watching his position on the video board coming down the stretch. The Lakewood, Wash. native will make his second straight trip to Eugene, looking to get into the final for the first time this year.

“In my past experiences I've realized you have to be prepared to go all out. I was prepared for any situation,” said Yorks. “My gameplan for each of the rounds has been basically just go to the front and key off whoever is in the front. If someone makes a move around me, then just go with them and move with them. Stick with that and get through the round in second or third, there's no need to win when the rounds just get through you through.”

Izaic runs a great quarterfinal heat, easily getting in the top five to get to Eugene for the second straight year in the 1500!

A video posted by UW Track (@uwtrack) on May 30, 2015 at 6:15pm PDT

The final qualifier through to Eugene was All-American Maddie Meyers in the 5,000-meters. The Seattle native went quickly to the front of the 24-woman heat that included sophomore Katie Knight, who also asserted herself up front early. Meyers ran in second-place for much of the race, with Knight just a few spots back. With about three laps to go, seven runners had separated themselves, and Meyers then went with three others in a lead pack of four. With the top-five automatically advancing, Meyers was able to cruise to the finish line in the top group, coming in fourth in 16:04.70. Knight would hang on for seventh-place in 16:12.04, and was in the mix for one of the two time qualifier spots, but the sixth and seventh finishers from the second heat would come in under Knight's time, which bumped her to 14th overall, a big step up from her 29th-place finish as a freshman last year.

With four entries in the field, it figured to be an exciting day for the Dawgs in the men's pole vault, but there proved to be even more dramatic than the typical vault, and not for all the right reasons from the UW perspective. Senior J.J. Juilfs first had a scary moment, as he came off the pole drifting to the right, and came down just off the edge of the mat on his knees, but he proved to be all right, and he even managed to clear the bar on that jump. Juilfs then had a clutch third-attempt make at 17-4 ½, a season-best outdoors by nearly four inches. But he missed three close tries at 17-6 ½, which proved to be the necessary height, and Juilfs finished his great Husky career in 14^th place.

Junior Jax Thoirs, the two-time Pac-12 Champion, came into the competition at 17-0 ¾ and cleared it on one attempt. But at the next height, Thoirs pulled up right after starting his approach with an apparent injury that turned out to be a cramp in his calf muscle. Thoirs decided to pass his attempts to try and recover from the cramp and then clear at a higher bar. Eventually the competition wrapped up for everyone but Thoirs, who had to be the only vaulter going at 17-8 ½. Thoirs gave it a shot, but it was clear he was not getting his usual lift, and he could not swing up to the bar on either try, bring a fantastic junior season to a very unfortunate ending.

Chris Williams and Lev Marcus also put themselves in the mix in the vault with some early clearances, but couldn't get over the last couple bars to get into the thick of it. Marcus capped his impressive redshirt freshman season with some theatrics, as he had a third-attempt make at 16-6 ¾ and then another third-attempt clearance at 17-0 ¾, but he went out after a third miss at 17-4 ½, finishing 22^nd. Williams cleared 16-6 ¾ on one jump but was unable to make the 17-foot bar, tying for 23^rd overall.

The Husky women's 4x100-meter relay was looking to make history, trying to become the first group to reach nationals since 1985. The group of Haley Jacobson, Kennadi Bouyer, Gianna Woodruff, and Sierra Peterson was coming off a school record and third-place finish at Pac-12s. Today the group was running out of lane nine in the first heat, and took fifth in the heat in a time of 44.94 seconds, their second-best time of the year and second time under the 45-second mark. UW had to watch the next two heats to see if their time would hold up, unfortunately the third heat results bumped the Dawgs out of the top-12 by one spot to the dreaded 13^th position.

The men's 4x100m relay made its regular appearance at West Prelims, but the Dawgs were unable to break through to Eugene. Lucas Strong and Jacopo Spano made their first runs at Prelims, along with Williams and Quadelle Satterwhite. The group, which took third at the Pac-12 meet, took sixth in its heat in 40.48 seconds, which ended up 18^th out of the 24 teams in the field.

Williams was back for his third event of the day in the 110m hurdles quarterfinals, looking to reach the final site for the first time since 2013. In the second heat, Williams was right in line with an even race, but he crossed the line just a couple steps behind the top-three advancers. He posted a time of 13.85 seconds, the second-fastest wind-legal time of his career, good for 18^th overall.

Senior Eleanor Fulton, a First Team All-American indoors in the DMR this year, ran the fastest 1,500-meters of her career, but it would be just a couple seconds short. She finished ninth in her heat in 4:19.59, which would wind up being 14^th overall when all was said and done.

One of the stories of the season for Washington was the huge breakout of redshirt freshman Casey Burns at the Pac-12 meet, where he took second overall with the No. 2 mark in school history. Coming in looking to follow that up with his first trip to Nationals, Burns hit the 50-foot mark twice more, which he had never done prior to Pac-12s, but he needed about a half foot more than his best jump of 50-6 ¾ to get to the twelfth spot. Burns wound up 18^th in the final standings, still outstanding for someone who was not in the top-48 until the Pac-12 meet.

Redshirt freshman Gina Flint, after setting a PR yesterday in the discus, closed out her season with another positive, as she was just a few inches off her season-best with a toss of 49-10. Ranking 39^th in the West coming into the meet, Flint finished 22^nd overall today.

Alanna Coker and Jaleecia Roland competed early in the afternoon in the triple jump, but neither were able to get the personal-bests needed to threaten the top twelve spots. Coker had a couple fouls before jumping 40-2 on her final attempt to finish 36^th overall. Roland had a best of 39-0 ¼ to wind up 42^nd.

The seven Huskies will now turn their attention to Eugene and the national meet, which takes on a new format this year with alternating days of only men's and women's events. The men's events will be Wednesday and Friday, June 10^th and 12^th, with women's events on Thursday and Saturday, June 11^th and 13^th.

Washington Track & Field

NCAA West Preliminary Championships

Day 3 of 3 – May 30, 2015

Austin, Texas – Mike A. Myers Stadium

Men's Results

1,500m Quarterfinals; Heat 2 of 2: 3. Izaic Yorks, 3:42.99 – Advances To Eugene

110m Hurdles Quarterfinals; Heat 2 of 3: 6. Chris Williams, 13.85 (16^th overall)

4x100m Relay; Heat 1 of 3: 6. Strong/Satterwhite/Spano/Williams, 40.48 (18^th overall)

Pole Vault: 14. J.J. Juilfs, 17-4 ½; 20. Jax Thoirs, 17-0 ¾; 22. Lev Marcus, 17-0 ¾; 23 (tie). Chris Williams, 16-6 ¾

Triple Jump: 18. Casey Burns, 50-6 ¾

Javelin: 3. Curtis Clauson, 238-8 – Advances To Eugene

Women's Results