Matt Phillips Earns All-America Award in Pole Vault at NCAA Track & Field Meet
June 1, 2000
Box Score
DURHAM, N.C. - Washington senior Matt Phillips earned All-America acclaim for an eighth-place tie in the men's pole vault and junior sprinter Ja'Warren Hooker advanced to the semifinals in his second event on Thursday during the second day of the NCAA track and field championships at Duke's Wallace Wade Stadium.
Phillps (Philomath, Ore.) cleared the opening height of 16-6 3/4 on his inaugural attempt and then was successful on his first try at 17-4 1/2 to tie Oklahoma's Michael Westlund for eighth place. Phillips, who missed all three attempts at 17-8 1/2, earned the first All-America certificate of his collegiate career.
Russ Buller of Louisiana State and Stanford's Toby Stevenson each cleared 18-4 1/2, but Buller was declared the winner on the basis of fewer misses.
Hooker clocked the eighth-fastest qualifying time in the 100-meter dash, a mark of 10.25 seconds. The Ellensburg (Wash.)High School product finished third in his heat to secure an automatic berth to Friday's semifinal round. Kaaron Conwright of Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo posted the swiftest 100-meter time, overcoming Hooker to win the heat in 10.10.
"My first 80 was real good and I felt like when I got to about 80 meters I kind of sat down a little bit and made a couple guys come up on me," Hooker explained. ". Other than that, it was a decent race. All you want to do is make it through each round with whatever time that may be. I'm happy with the time today and tomorrow will be better.
On Friday, Hooker will compete in two events, running semifinal races in both the 100 and 200 meters. He registered the fifth-fastest quarterfinal time of 20.67 on Thursday in the 200 meters, an event in which he is ranked No. 4.
Hooker couldn't recall the last time he ran a race on the extreme outside in lane No. 8 as he did in the 100-meter quarterfinals. Rather than assigning the preferred inside lanes to sprinters with the fastest entry times, the NCAA championship meet procedure is to randomly distribute lanes in first-round races.
"That's like an island out there, lane one and lane eight," remarked Hooker. ".Those are positions you don't like to be in. You can't really judge where you are in the race because you can't see everyone."
Husky senior Ben Lindsey completed his collegiate career with a 14th-place performance in the men's shot put. The Lynnwood (Wash.) High School graduate registered a put of 58 feet, 7 1/2 inches. That mark is well short of the season-best effort of 63-11 3/4 that he posted on May 20 in Eugene, Ore. to win the Pacific-10 Conference championship. A similar effort on Thursday would have placed Lindsey fifth.
Idaho's Joachim Olsen claimed the shot put title with a mark of 66-5 3/4.
In the women's 3,000-meter semifinal races, Washington seniors Cami Matson (Kent, Wash./Tahoma HS) and Margaret Butler (West Vancouver, B.C.) finished 14th and 17th, respectively and failed to advance to the finals. Matson finished seventh in her race with a time of 9:39.15 and Butler had an eighth-place time of 9:53.14 in her heat.
Five Washington athletes, including Hooker, will compete Friday. Senior Jacob Predmore (Duvall, Wash./Cedarcrest HS) begins the two-day decathlon, senior Justin St. Clair (Tacoma, Wash./Franklin Pierce HS) participates in the men's javelin, senior Sesilia Thomas (Spanaway, Wash./Spanaway Lake HS) in the women's shot put and sophomore Sandy Erickson (Whitefish, Mont.) in the women's pole vault.
