Monday, March 16, 1998
Bruins pull out all the stops at NCAA Indoor Championships
Team adorns itself in excitment of game, although no one brings
home national championship
By Donald Morrison
Daily Bruin Contributor
While no one claimed a national championship at the NCAA Indoor
Championships, members of the UCLA men’s track and field team still
entertained the crowd Friday and Saturday in Indianapolis, Ind.
Mebrahtom Keflezighi, running the 5,000 meters, nearly won his
fifth NCAA championship. Keflezighi, who had to cut back on
training the past two weeks due to soreness in his lower left leg,
finished third in a tactical race in 14 minutes flat.
Keflezighi stayed in the front pack for most of the race before
taking the lead with three laps to go on the 200-meter track.
With close to 150 meters remaining in the race, Brad Hauser from
Stanford came up on Keflezighi and bumped him, causing Keflezighi
to stumble a bit.
That stumble was all Hauser needed to win the race and for
Keflezighi to fall to third. UCLA head coach Bob Larsen felt the
contact was unintentional.
"It wasn’t a particularly fast race," UCLA head coach Bob Larsen
said.
"(Keflezighi) caught a good elbow and couldn’t rally. He felt he
could still win, but he was jostled."
The 5,000-meter race wasn’t the only excitement Keflezighi
created in one day. He also ran the 1,600-meter leg in the Distance
Medly Relay less than a half hour after the 5,000 meters.
Washington State set a World’s Best time of 9:29.54 in the
highly competitive race, and Arkansas finished second in 9:30.45.
UCLA placed seventh in 9:42.23, but it was Keflezighi who made the
crowd roar.
Taking the baton from Jess Strutzel, who completed 800 meters,
Keflezighi moved all the way up to third place at one point before
falling to seventh. Keflezighi’s split time for the 1,600 meters,
about one mile, was 4:04.
"(Keflezghi) is very competitive," Larsen says. "The crowd got
into it when they saw him move to third. We had a good time for a
makeshift relay."
The original relay was supposed to consist of Damian Allen and
Michael Granville, but Granville sat out because of a sore
hamstring, and Larsen rested Allen for the 200-meter finals.
Scott Slover could have possibly won the pole vault title but
was disqualified for voulzing the bar at 18-2 1/2 feet. Voulzing is
when a person uses his hands or arms to try to balance the bar.
He finished seventh at 17-10 1/2. Larsen felt the call was
correct and was disappointed because Slover cleared 18-2 1/2, a
mark that would’ve placed him at least fourth. He nonetheless
garnered All-American honors.
Allen is another Bruin who claimed All-American honors. Allen,
at his first indoor championships, finished seventh in the 200
meters in a personal record time of 21.06 seconds.
Mark Hauser finished 14th in an extremely fast 3,000 meter race
in 8:10.19. The winner, Adam Goucher of Colorado won in 7:46.03
seconds and Washington State’s Bernard Lagat finished second in
7:46.45.
Travis Haynes and Wade Tift both received All-American honors in
the shot put. Haynes finished eighth with a mark of 60-6 1/2, and
Tift was right behind him in ninth place at 60-5 3/4.
Luke Sullivan, also at his first indoor championship, earned an
All-American spot in the 35-pound weight throw. Sullivan’s throw of
65-7 3/4 placed him fifth.
Jim McElroy had a good start in his preliminary race but
stumbled three-quarters of the way through and missed the finals by
two-hundredths of a second.
"It was a good meet," Larsen said. "Generally, we don’t do much
indoors but I think this meet is a good introduction to the outdoor
season."