Monday, March 9, 1998
UCLA wins season’s first outdoor meet in a walk
TRACK:
By Donald Morrison and Alvin Cadman
Daily Bruin Contributors
It was just another Saturday afternoon at Drake Stadium for the
UCLA men’s and women’s track teams. The Bruins, behind some
surprisingly fast early season marks, opened up their outdoor
season with easy wins at a quad meet over Long Beach State, Cal
State Los Angeles and UC Santa Barbara.
UCLA destroyed its competition, winning the meet with 114
points. UCSB finished second with 28 points, Cal State Los Angeles
placed third with 25 points and the 49ers had 21 points.
Damian Allen, on his way to NCAA Indoor Nationals next week,
opened up his outdoor season by cruising the 400 meters in 46.88
seconds to gain a victory and match his previous personal best at
the event.
"I think Allen looked especially good," UCLA head coach Bob
Larsen said. "That’s an awfully good 400 meters this early for
him."
Josh Johnson smashed his old personal record in the javelin
throw, winning the event with a mark of 236 feet, 10 inches.
Johnson won the event by close to 49 feet over teammate Joe
Franklin, who threw 187-2. Johnson’s old personal best was
230-1.
Matt Olin set a personal record in the 3000, winning the event
in 8 minutes, 27.66 seconds. In his first collegiate 1500, Jess
Strutzel won in 3:51.93 seconds.
"We knew since last year that (Strutzel) had the potential to be
a 1500-meter runner," Larsen said. "That’s a pretty impressive
performance."
The sprinters and hurdlers turned in solid performances.
Freshman Bryan Harrison won the 100 dash in 10.67 seconds, and Jim
McElroy cruised the 200 in 21.36 seconds. Gerimi Burleigh won the
110 high-hurdles in 14.56 seconds. Brian Fell easily won the 400
meter hurdles in 52.86 seconds.
The Bruins also gained victories in the throwing and jumping
events.
Luke Sullivan won both the hammer throw, with a mark of 203-7,
and the discus with a throw of 184-10. Wade Tift won the shot put
with a heave of 59-2. Lester DeRaad won the high jump with a leap
of 6-8, and Mark Hauser won the 800 meters in 1:52.11.
UCLA’s 4-by-100-meter relay team of Brandon Thomas, Harrison,
Allen and McElroy crushed UCSB in 40.68 seconds.
The 4-by-400-meter relay team of Allen, Fell, McElroy, and
Michael Granville won in 3:17.31.
* * *
UCLA’s women’s track and field team completed their first step
toward their run at a 1998 Pac-10 and NCAA Outdoor
Championship.
The Bruins won the quadrangular meet with a total team score of
115 points over runner-up Long Beach State (30.5), UCSB (29) and
Cal State Los Angeles (18.5).
UCLA’s trio of Deanna Simmons, Kelly O’Connor and Keisha Porter
swept the women’s long jump on Saturday afternoon. Simmons won with
a jump of 19-1, ahead of good showings from O’Connor (18-5) and
Porter (18-4). Simmons also went on to capture the triple jump with
a mark of 43-5.
Rachelle Noble and Seilala Sua took the top two places in the
women’s hammer throw with little competition from the rest of the
field.
Noble’s top mark of 193-0 and Sua’s best throw of 179.9 are
early signs of good things to come from these two Bruin women. Sua
and Noble went on to take first and third, respectively, in the
women’s discus with 1997 All-Americans Suzy Powell and Nada Kawar
taking second and fourth places.
UCLA took first in the 400 and 1600-meter relays, winning 45.5
seconds and three minutes 51.56 seconds respectively.
With both relay teams consisting of All-Americans Bisa Grant and
Joanna Hayes, freshmen Shakedia Jones, Michelle Perry, alternate
Damesha Craig, the Bruin women look strong heading into the Cal
State Fullerton Invitational next weekend.
Julie Ott won the 3000 with a time of 10:01.20. In the 1500,
Christina Bowen, Melinda George and Kara Barnard completed a UCLA
sweep over the rest of the competition. Only five seconds separated
the Bruin women behind Bowen’s winning time of 4:30.79.
Hayes, ranked tenth in the nation in hurdles, won the 200 and
400-meter sprints with winning times of 24.66 and 55.60 seconds,
respectively. This was Hayes’ first meet since recovering from a
hyper-extended knee.