Justin St. Clair and Sesilia Thomas Garner All-America Honors at NCAA Track & Field Meet
June 2, 2000
Box Score
DURHAM, N.C. - Washington junior Justin St. Clair and senior Sesilia Thomas each earned All-America acclaim and junior sprinter Ja'Warren Hooker qualified for the finals of the men's 200-meter dash on Friday during the third day of the NCAA track and field championships at Duke's Wallace Wade Stadium.
St. Clair unleashed a thr of 223 feet, 3 inches on his third, and final, preliminary attempt to vault into sixth place and earn three more throws in the nine-man finals. None of the finalists improved upon their preliminary performances.
"I was itching to throw and couldn't wait to get on the runway," said St. Clair who placed sixth despite ranking No. 13 entering the competition. "Last year's experience really helped me. Some of the people that were ranked above me were a little bit younger and they maybe didn't know what to expect. From last year I learned not to pay too much attention to the other people and to come in confident."
A product of Tacoma's Franklin Pierce High School, St. Clair earned his second All-America certificate, improving upon his 12th-place effort at the 1999 championships. He competed under difficult circumstances.
The javelin was contested in the middle of the day, ending at 1 p.m. Eastern Time under 92-degree conditions with 44-percent humidity. The heat index was 95 degrees.
"We're not use to this I'll tell you that. By the time finals came I was so dead that I was surprised I threw over 220," said an exhausted St. Clair who neared his best mark with throws of 221-6 and 221-7 on his final two attempts.
Arizona's Esko Mikkola, the Pacific-10 Conference champion, recorded a winning javelin throw of 238-3. At that Pac-10 meet, St. Clair finished a dismal 11th after entering that meet ranked No. 3.
"I was highly disappointed at Pac-10s, highly disappointed," St. Clair remarked. "I had to come out here and redeem myself a little bit."
The sixth-place NCAA result was the best javelin finish by a UW athlete since Troy Burkholder placed fourth in 1996. It was a fitting finish for throws coach Ken Shannon who ends a 40-year coaching career with this meet, including 32 years at Washington. Shannon spent 29 years, from 1969 through 1997 as the Husky men's head coach. Under his tutelage, a UW javelin competitor placed among the top-13 NCAA finishers during 17 of the last 19 years.
The Washington athlete most affected by the overwhelming heat was senior Jacob Predmore who spent nearly nine hours in the sun while competing in his fifth career decathlon. He finished the first day in sixth place with a score of 3,880 that is only one point shy of his personal-best total.
"The weather is just too much. I knew it was going to be hot, but I wasn't prepared for it to be this hot," said Predmore who was already thinking ahead to Saturday's final five events. "The hurdles are one of my stronger events and the discus and pole vault are definitely two of my weaker events. These guys in front of me, I don't know how good their second days are."
A graduate of Cedarcrest High School in Duvall, Wash., Predmore registered career-best marks in two events. He opened the decathlon with a 11.27-second clocking in the 100 meters and a shot put of 42-8. Predmore's long jump of 23-1 1/4 was the third best in the field, he tied for fifth with a 6-5 clearance in the high jump and he completed the 400 meters in 49.85.
Louisiana State's Claston Bernard posted a 4,222-point tally to take the first-day lead, followed by Tennessee's Stephen Harris (4,153), California's Bevan Hart (4,035) and Brigham Young's Curtis Pugsley (3,972). Predmore is just 12 points behind the fifth-place total of 3,892 recorded by Aaron Moser of Miami.
Thomas had her career-best shot put on her third attempt, earning a spot in the nine-woman finals. She finished eighth with a mark of 50-8 3/4 that was an improvement of 43/4 inches over her previous top performance. The Spanaway Lake (Wash.) High School graduate earned All-America accolades for the first time.
Thomas was the final individual invited to compete in the 23-woman championship field. She was at home last Thursday convinced her collegiate career was over when she got a call from Husky coach Orin Richburg confirming the unexpected bid to the championships meet.
"I'm really proud and happy. To go from not knowing I'm coming to finishing eighth is something else," an ecstatic Thomas said. "My goal was to not come out last."
UCLA's Seilala Sua won her second straight shot put title with a mark of 56-11 1/2. On Thursday, Sua won her fourth discus crown to become the first woman in NCAA history to win four consecutive championships in a single field event.
Hooker clocked a time of 20.47 in the 200-meter semifinals, placing third in his heat to secure a berth in Saturday's championship race. His mark was the sixth-fastest in the semifinals. Auburn's Coby Miller raced to a time of 20.28 to lead all qualifiers.
A product of Ellensburg (Wash.) High School, Hooker successfully advanced in the 200 just one hour after his elimination from the 100-meter competition. He finished sixth in his 100-meter semifinal heat with a time of 10.35. He was able to put the disappointment behind him.
"If you have another race it's either put it away and take all that anger to your next race or just sulk in it and have two bad races in a row," remarked Hooker the Pac-10 champion in the 100 and 200 meters. "Once you get to nationals you don't want to sulk too much, you just want to get to the next race as fast as you can so you can make up for a bad race."
The 200-meter championship race takes place Saturday afternoon at the conclusion of the four-day NCAA meet.
In the women's pole vault, Washington sophomore Sandy Erickson (Whitefish, Mont.) cleared 12-3 1/2 to place 16th.
UCLA's Tracy O'Hara, the 1999 runner-up, established a new meet record of 14-5 1/4 en route to winning the pole vault title.
Joining Washington teammates Hooker and Predmore in competition on Saturday will be junior David Bazzi (Seattle, Wash./O'Dea HS) in the men's 5,000-meter run. Bazzi is the final individual to compete in the 12-athlete contingent that is Washington's largest at an NCAA championship meet since 1990.
