SEC INDOOR – Team Scores
Men: 1. Arkansas 98, 2. Alabama 93, 3. tie, Florida, Mississippi & Texas A&M 76, 6. Georgia 67, 7. Kentucky 44, 8. LSU 42, 9. Auburn 40, 10. Tennessee 23.5, 11. South Carolina 17.5, 12. Mississippi State 5, 13. Missouri 3.
Women: 1. Arkansas 106.5, 2. LSU 94, 3. Kentucky 72, 4. Georgia 4, 5. Mississippi 61.5, 6. Alabama 47, 7. Texas A&M 47, 8. Florida 45, 9. Mississippi State 30.5, 10. Missouri 30, 11. Auburn 26, 12. Tennessee 14.5, 13. tie, South Carolina & Vanderbilt 9.
NASHVILLE – Texas A&M claimed three individual conference titles on Saturday and won the men’s 4×400 relay in 3:02.39, the fastest time ever recorded on an oversized track, inside Vanderbilt’s Multipurpose Facility on the final day of the SEC Indoor Championships.
Victories for the Aggies included a second consecutive pole vault title for Audie Wyatt and initial SEC titles for Fred Kerley in the 400m and Jazmine Fray in the 800m.
“We had a really good meet across the board,” said Texas A&M head coach Pat Henry. “I’m disappointed with the points on both sides a little bit. With the men we tie for third and we had someone knocked down in the 800m. But that’s track, something like that happens all the time.”
Texas A&M men finished in a three-way tie for third place in team scoring at 76 points along with Florida and Mississippi. It’s the fourth time in five years the Aggies have finished third at the SEC Indoor, last year they were runner-up. The Aggie women finished seventh with 47 points, matching their place from a year ago when they scored 44 points.
A sweep of team titles went to the Arkansas men and women for the second consecutive year. The Razorback men totaled 98 points as Alabama challenged with 93. Arkansas women produced 106.5 points with LSU runner-up again at 94.
“Performance-wise you look at what happened at this track meet and there is nowhere in the world that can match what happened here today, in any event,” stated Henry. “It’s incredible. It’s an SEC Championship, we were unable to win it, and a great team won it, but it was awfully close.”
The final race of the meet had Texas A&M producing its fastest time ever in the 4×400 with a clocking of 3:02.39 from the quartet of Fred Kerley (45.0), Richard Rose (45.8), Devin Dixon (46.1) and Mylik Kerley (45.5). It also bettered the collegiate record of 3:02.52 set by the Aggies earlier this season.
Florida challenged on the middle two legs, taking over the lead, but were unable to withstand the finish by Mylik Kerley on the anchor leg over the last stages of the race. The Gators were runner-up in 3:02.73 while Alabama claimed third in 3:02.92. All three teams bettered the previous best on an oversized track
of 3:02.95 set at altitude by SMU in 1985.
After winning the pole vault with a clearance of 17-11 (5.46), Wyatt moved the bar to 18-2 (5.54) in an attempt to break the school record of 18-1 he set in winning the conference title a year ago. Teammates Carl Johansson, who set a career indoor best of 17-4 ½ (5.30), and Jacob Wooten, who also cleared 17-4 ½, finished third and fifth as the Aggies totaled 20 points in the event.
Earlier in the meet Fred Kerley won the 400m title in 45.20 while his brother Mylik finished fourth in 45.75. At that stage the 15 points moved the Aggies into a tie for third place with Mississippi, who had just scored 25 points in the mile.
The time by Kerley is the third fastest ever run on an oversized track in the 400m, trailing his 44.94 from
Friday’s prelim race and the 45.19 set in 1986 by Antonio McKay.
“The goal is to be part of something great this year,” said Kerley. “So, I feel blessed to have gold medals from two events at the SEC Championships. In the relay we ran the fastest time ever at Texas A&M. It’s only up from here for the NCAAs, I believe we will open up the gap even better.”
Finishing runner-up to Kerley was Auburn’s Akeem Bloomfield (45.43) while Obi Ogbokwe of Arkansas placed third with a 45.73 that barely edged Mylik in the first section of the final.
Jazmine Fray raced out to the front of the 800m and pulled away from the field, splitting 28.87 at 200m and 1:15.74 at 500m on the 300m track. Fray maintained her edge throughout the race and won in 2:02.62, the second fastest time in school history behind the collegiate record 2:00.69 she set two weeks ago.
LSU freshman Ruby Stauber challenged Fray and finished second in 2:04.31 with Maddie McHugh of Mississippi in third at 2:05.38. Aggie Katie Willard placed sixth in 2:08.31 as Texas A&M picked up 13 points in the event.
Lindon Victor improved his school record in the heptathlon to 5,851 points as he finished runner-up to the 6,047 winning total for Devon Williams of Georgia. Victor bettered the Texas A&M record of 5,805 points he set earlier this season. Teammate Nathan Hite placed ninth with a score of 5,309 points, just missing a scoring place by 98 points.
Victor’s second day of the multi-event included a time of 8.26 for 917 points in the 60m hurdles and a clearance of 15-5 (4.70) in the pole vault for 819 points. In the 1,000m Victor ran 2:52.95 for 735 points.
The Aggie women scored 15 points in the 200m final as the trio of Danyel White (23.42), Aaliyah Brown (23.44) and Diamond Spaulding (23.46) finished 1-2-3 in the first section and placed 3-4-5 overall. A career best of 53.56 placed Aggie freshman Jaevin Reed sixth in the women’s 400m final and moved her to No. 9 on the school’s all-time list.
JaQwae Ellison placed fifth in the men’s 800m, but Devin Dixon was tripped from behind with a lap remaining. Ellison posted a career best time of 1:48.72 while Dixon got back up to finish eighth in 2:09.09. The race was won in 1:47.18 by Florida’s Andres Arroyo.
In the women’s 4×400 the Aggies ran 3:32.56 with the crew of Jaevin Reed, Danyel White, Jazmine Fray and Kadecia Baird. They finished second in their section behind LSU (3:31.50), and were fourth overall with Florida (3:32.06) and Arkansas (3:32.27) taking second and third from another section.
Relay action in the distance medley had the men finishing sixth in 9:47.43 with the foursome of Cameron Villarreal, Robert Grant, Kinsey Gaines, and Alex Riba. The women placed seventh in 11:31.95, No. 3 on the Aggie all-time list, with a crew of Arin Rice, Briyahna Desrosiers, Brittany Parker and Hannah Campbell.
Kara Erickson finished in a three-way tie for sixth place in the high jump as she cleared 5-6 ½ (1.69) to score two points. Georgia finished 1-2 in the event for 18 points with Madeline Fagan winning the event at 6-1 ½ (1.87).
In the men’s triple jump Jeffrey Prothro placed seventh with a mark of 50-5 ¼ (15.37), which came in the sixth round. Lajarvia Brown finished 11th in the women’s triple jump as she produced a best of 41-11 ¼ (12.78), which moved her to No. 9 on the Aggie all-time list.
Alison Ondrusek tossed a career best of 67-6 ¾ (20.59) on her first attempt in the weight throw, adding nearly two feet to her previous best. It improved her No. 2 performer position on the Aggie all-time list as she finished eighth in the competition. Teammate Carissa van Beek placed 14th with a mark of 62-5 ¾ (19.04).
Texas A&M finished ninth and 10th in the men’s mile with the tandem of Alex Riba (4:08.17) and Taylor Clayton (4:09.90). Jeff Bartlett finished 11th in the men’s shot put and his career best toss of 58-1 (17.70) moves him to No. 10 on the Aggie all-time list, the first addition since 2006.
Story courtesy of Texas A&M Athletics