The preseason national rankings for the outdoor track and field season have the Aggie women No. 1 and the A&M men No. 2. Both squads enter the outdoor campaign as two-time defending NCAA Champions.
Released by USTFCCCA, the preseason rankings highlight returning points each team has for the 2011 season based on the performances attained in 2010. Rankings will be altered each week as marks from freshmen and transfers are factored in as well as improvement of marks by returning athletes.
Texas A&M tops the women’s rankings ahead of 2. Oregon, 3. LSU, 4. Oklahoma, 5. USC, 6. Clemson, 7. Texas, 8. Florida State, 9. Arkansas, and 10. Auburn. Other Big 12 schools in the top 25 include Texas Tech (12), Kansas (14), Colorado (21) and Baylor (24).
Florida, the team runner-up to the Aggie men in the last two NCAA Outdoor Championships, takes the No. 1 spot followed by Texas A&M. The rest of the top 10 includes 3. Texas Tech, 4. Florida State, 5. LSU, 6. USC, 7. Stanford, 8. Mississippi State, 9. Nebraska, and 10. Minnesota. Other Big 12 schools in the top 25 include Oklahoma (15), Texas (17), and Kansas State (19).
ARIZONA STATE INVITATIONAL
Texas A&M will compete in the Arizona State Invitational this weekend at Sun Angel Stadium in Tempe. Other teams in the meet include Baylor, Boise State, Georgia, Kansas State, New Mexico, Northern Arizona, Notre Dame, South Dakota State, TCU, UC Riverside, Utah (w) and Weber State.
The hammer and pole vault will be contested on Friday, starting at 1 p.m. and 6 p.m. (PDT), respectively. Saturday’s field events begin at 10 a.m. while running events start at 5 p.m.
In just the second week of the outdoor season the Aggies will have some interesting sprint match-ups with Baylor and TCU while in Arizona along with some solid distance encounters with Kansas State, New Mexico and Northern Arizona.
Both sprint relays and 4 x 400 relays feature races between Baylor, TCU, Texas A&M and host Arizona State.
NCAA Indoor 400m champions Jessica Beard and Demetrius Pinder will each contest the 200 meters. Pinder is running in the same section as Olympic 400m champion Jeremy Wariner. Running against Beard will be Tiandra Ponteen, of St. Kitts & Nevis, who was a NCAA 400 runner-up in 2005 for Florida.
In the 100 hurdles Natasha Ruddock and Donique’ Flemings will run in the same section as Baylor’s Tiffani McReynolds, who won the Big 12 title and was NCAA runner-up in the 60 hurdles this season.
Bryan Miller is stationed in the same 400-meter section as Olympian Wallace Spearmon, Jarrin Soloman of Trinidad, Baylor’s Marcus Boyd and TCU’s Matt Love.
Ibukun Mayungbe competes in the same section of the women’s 400 along with TCU’s trio of Jessica Young, Kristal Juarez and Quinterra Charles as well as the Baylor tandem of Diamond Richardson and Brittany Bruce.
The women’s first section of the 100 will feature three Aggie sprinters – Ashley Collier, Dominique Duncan and LaKeidra Stewart – squaring off against Baylor’s Tiffany Townsend and four TCU sprinters.
Gerald Phiri and Prezel Hardy, Jr. are in the same 100 section as Kansas State’s Martynas Jurgilas, the winner at the Aztec Invitational last weekend, TCU’s Charles Silmon and Baylor’s Woodrow Randall. Phiri and Hardy will also compete in the 200 along with Michael Bryan and Carlyle Roudette.
Six A&M runners will be contesting the 800 meters. Section one includes Michael Preble, Joey Roberts and Oscar Ramirez. James Bonn and Sam Mutschler are in section two and Ethan Doherty will run in section three.
The Aggie women have five athletes in the 800 with a crew that includes Erica Parker, Hillary Hagan and Aliese Hyde in section one along with Taylor Buckner and Tiffany Singleton in section two.
Andrea Sutherland has an early Big 12 preview as she competes in the 400 hurdles for the first time this season. In the same section are Ryann Krais of Kansas State, Baylor’s Christina Holland and four hurdlers from Arizona State.
The men’s 1,500 meters includes four A&M runners – Will Barry, Kevin Burnett, MacLean O’Donnell and Wes Caceras. Running the women’s 1,500 are Katherine Devlin, Colbea Harris, Kasey McNorton and Natosha Rogers. In the 5,000 the Aggies have Itzel Cetina in the women’s race and Austin Geerts in the men’s race. Stephen Curry and Dylan Williams will compete in the 3,000-meter steeplechase.
Friday’s action in the hammer will include Casey Strong, Landon Hartwick and Cole Knuth. In the vault the Aggies have entered school record holder Laura Asimakis and Aly Daily in the women’s event along with Dustin Phillips and Colton Sandman in the men’s competition.
Julian Reid and Tyron Stewart are scheduled for the long jump while Sasha-Kay Matthias will contest the triple jump after winning the event at the Aztec Invitational last weekend. Tiffany Peters and Fitzpatrick compete in the long jump. In the high jump for A&M are Cameron Alexander and Tyler Lee.
In the javelin six Aggies will compete. In the women’s field are Daily, Bonnie Richardson, Lauren Berg, Daphne Fitzpatrick and Kelly Czumble. Jon Gomez is in the men’s field. Knuth is also throwing in the discus while Jill Hydrick is in the women’s discus.