SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Washington State 1500m runners
Chandler Teigen and
Kaili Keefe were the final Cougars to advance to the NCAA Championships during the third and last day of the NCAA West Region Preliminary Rounds at Hornet Stadium on the Sacramento State campus. Of the 48 competitors in each event, the top 12 advance to the NCAA Championships, June 6-9, at Hayward Field in Eugene.
Teigen, a junior from Anatone, Wash., finished fourth in the second heat of the men's 1500m quarterfinals where the top five in each heat automatically advanced to the semifinals in Eugene. Teigen's time Saturday was 3 minutes 43.41 seconds, just off his PR time of 3:43.13 which was run at the Stanford Invitational this spring.
Keefe, a sophomore from Yakima, Wash., will compete in Eugene in the women's 1500m after running a PR time of 4:16.57 which was 12th-fastest time Saturday. Keefe's quarterfinals time was four seconds faster than her previous PR and is the second-fastest in WSU's all-time records.
THEY SAID:
Wayne Phipps, WSU Director of Cross Country/Track & Field, said, "Another exciting evening, highlighted by two awesome 1500m races and two more national qualifiers. Kaili ran a gutsy race and battled all the way to the finish to run a four-second PR and grab a time qualifier. Chandler, again, used an awesome last lap to automatically qualify. Both runners gained a lot of confidence from this weekend which is going to make a huge difference at the NCAA finals. Greer competed very well with a great PR jump and it took until the very last flight for her to get bumped from an NCAA qualifying spot. Overall, it was a great meet for us and I'm very excited about this group heading to Eugene."
Chandler Teigen, junior 1500m qualifier, said, "The race seemed pretty standard for a qualifying round. It was fast at first, slowed down for a lap then was a sprint to the finish at the end. Going forward I am going to stick with the plan of peaking for this part of the season, and preparing to qualify for the NCAA Final in two weeks."
Kaili Keefe, sophomore 1500m qualifier, said, "For this race I didn't want to overthink it and knew if I just went out and raced things would fall into place. I kept reminding myself that a spot to nationals was anyone's in the field. I had no idea I was running a PR pace until I had finished and just put my effort into truly racing."
OTHER COUGARS COMPETING MAY 26 AT NCAA WEST REGION PRELIMS
MEN
200m Quarterfinals - 21st.
Zach Smith (21.16)
5000m Semifinals - 40th.
Michael Williams (14:38.56)
High Jump - t-34th.
Peyton Fredrickson (2.06m/6-9)
Javelin - 22nd.
Cole Smith (63.23m/207-5)
WOMEN
5000m -23rd.
Vallery Korir (16:09.98)
Triple Jump - 18th.
Greer Alsop (PR 12.81m/42-0 1/2)
NOTEWORTHY:
- Greer Alsop (redshirt senior, Invercargill, New Zealand) ended her collegiate career with a PR triple jump of 12.81m/42-0 1/2 improving her fourth-best mark in WSU all-time records
