University of Washington
NCAA Outdoor Championships
Owsinski Flies To Fourth With School Record Vault
June 12, 2015 | Track & Field
NCAA Outdoor Championships
Eugene, Ore. - Hayward Field
June 10-13
Live Results | Meet Schedule | USTFCCCA Home Page
LIVE BROADCAST SCHEDULE:
Wednesday
ESPNU - 4:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Thursday
ESPNU - 4:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.
ESPN - 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Friday
ESPN - 4:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.
Saturday
ESPN2 - 2:00 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.
Live field event coverage on ESPN3 begins: Wednesday (11:00 a.m.); Thursday (10:00 a.m.); Friday (4:00 p.m.); Saturday (1:30 p.m.)
EVENT SCHEDULE: Following is the schedule in Eugene for the Husky athletes competing in the NCAA Championships. All times are Pacific.
Wednesday, June 10
4:14 p.m. - Men's 1,500-meters; Semifinals - Izaic Yorks - Advanced to final
4:38 p.m. - Men's 3,000m Steeplechase; Semifinals - Meron Simon - 21st-place
5:00 p.m. - Men's Javelin; Finals - Curtis Clauson - 9th-place
Thursday, June 11
4:28 p.m. - Women's 800-meters; Semifinals - Baylee Mires - 13th-place (11th best time)
4:45 p.m. - Women's Pole Vault; Finals - Kristina Owsinski - 4th-place (School record)
6:00 p.m. - Women's 400m Hurdles; Semifinals - Gianna Woodruff - 12th-place
Friday, June 12
4:45 p.m. - Men's 1,500-meters; Finals - Izaic Yorks
Saturday, June 13
4:00 p.m. - Women's 5,000-meters; Finals - Maddie Meyers
EUGENE, Ore. – The Huskies are on the board at the NCAA Outdoor Championships for the first time thanks to the high flying acrobatics of junior Kristina Owsinski, as she flew to a school record in the pole vault and a fourth-place finish today at Hayward Field. The Ridgefield, Wash. native cleared 14-feet, 5.25-inches to pick up five points for the Husky women's team effort.
This was the first of two days of women's competition at the NCAA Championships, which has split the men's and women's events into separate days for the first time. The men will resume tomorrow with junior Izaic Yorks in the 1,500-meters final. The last Husky to compete will be sophomore Maddie Meyers in the women's 5,000-meters on Saturday.
On the track today, senior Gianna Woodruff ran the fastest 400-meters of her outstanding career, setting a PR by over two-tenths of a second at 57.49, but it wasn't quite enough to crack the top-eight and reach the final. Junior Baylee Mires also saw her season come to a close as she had the 11th-fastest time in the 800-meter semifinals.
Owsinski, the reigning Pac-12 Champion, was making her NCAA Outdoor debut to cap what has been a fantastic breakout 2015 season. She made NCAA Indoors for the first time back in March, tying for ninth-place, while teammate Diamara Planell Cruz was fourth-place. Today it was Owsinski picking up the fourth-place hardware, as she cleared two straight PRs, the second of which broke the school record of 14-4 ½ held by Logan Miller, herself a fourth-place NCAA finisher, in 2012.
“I usually get a little bit jittery at these meets, but today I was very calm,” said Owsinski. “I kept myself hydrated and I kept myself energized throughout the whole competition … Really get my first attempt jumps in and not stress my coach out too much. I felt really good jumping today. It was perfect weather and a perfect tail wind and it got me on the poles I needed to jump high.”
In her last couple outings, Owsinski had survived some early stress with third-attempt makes before getting on a roll, but today she had no such drama. She started with a first attempt clearance at 13-3 ½, then added another first attempt at 13-9 ¼, and one more at 14-1 ¼ which only seven vaulters cleared. After one miss, Owsinski got over 14-3 ¼, a new PR at that point, breaking her old mark of 14-2 ½. With five vaulters left, Owsinski then got the new school record on her first attempt, making it over 14-5 ¼. She would have three very close tries at 14-7 ¼, which would have tied the meet record. It just so happened that the two best vaulters in NCAA history took the top two spots, as Demi Payne of Stephen F. Austin went 15-5 and Sandi Morris of Arkansas went 15-3, both crushing the old meet record.
Owsinski's mark was equal to the winning mark from 2014, and would have equaled or bettered the winning mark in seven of the last eleven years. Kate Soma's winning mark in 2005 was 14-1 ¾. Owsinski is the seventh different women's vaulter to score at an NCAA Championship under assistant coach Pat Licari.
“Ultimately I wanted to come here and score a point for my team, and get a PR in, and I did both of those things today,” Owsinski said. “It's crazy, I've been chasing this record for a while, and I was chasing 14-feet for a while as well. So to finally have it all come together at this meet that means so much made it even better. So I'm really excited but I'm also excited to move on from here and do bigger things and hopefully break my own school record.”
Woodruff saved her best for last but was just a shade away from making the first NCAA final she was hoping for. In the first of three semifinal heats, Woodruff was around sixth at the 200-meter mark, but had one of the best closing kicks of her career to move up into third and threaten a second-place finish, which would have been an auto spot to the final. She finished third in 57.49, well under her previous career-best of 57.72, but just behind USC's Jaide Stepter who got second in 57.49.
Woodruff's time wound up the 12th-fastest of the day, earning her All-America Second Team honors for the second time in the 400m hurdles, to go with a First Team All-America honor in the DMR indoors. She also took over third-place on the UW top-10 by herself, breaking a tie with former teammate Kayla Stueckle.
“I didn't really have a target time, I was just going out and running and whatever happened would happen, so the PR came with it and that was pretty amazing,” said Woodruff. “It took a while for me to PR, this whole season I've been waiting. But better to do it here at NCAA's than earlier and then not have one here. We knew that today was going to be the day for it.
The only senior out of the seven Huskies here at nationals, Woodruff was satisfied with her performance, but it was bittersweet. “I'm sad not so much that I didn't make the final, but moreso because it was my last college meet. I have USA's, but this is different. I've worked my whole college career for this, so this is tough. But it was one of the best finishes of my entire life. I don't even know where that energy came from. I just thought I'm not going to go out without fighting, and that's what I did.
In the first semifinal heat of the women's 800-meters, the eight competitors went out hard and never relented. Mires was at the back at the bell, but made a push back into the mix on the backstretch. She couldn't quite get into a higher gear down the last stretch, however, and came in seventh in her heat in 2:05.33, the second-fastest outdoor mark of her career. That wound up being 11th-fastest overall, with two slower times from heat two making the final. Mires will earn All-America Second Team honors for the effort and she is now a four-time All-American.
Washington Track & Field
NCAA Outdoor Championships
June 11, 2015 – Women's Day 1 of 2
Eugene, Ore. – Hayward Field
Women's Results
800m Semifinal; Heat 1 of 3: 7. Baylee Mires, 2:05.33 (13th overall)
400m Hurdles Semifinal; Heat 1 of 3: 3. Gianna Woodruff, 57.49 (12th overall)
Pole Vault: 4. Kristina Owsinski, 14-5 ¼ (School Record)
Players Mentioned
