NCAA Duck Men's Track Results Through Day One

[Bruce3404]

It's official.  The Duck men will score less points than Harvard (which has 13 thus far).  I thought Alex Slenning did a great job finishing in the steeplechase (even though the TV people don't seem to understand that the races for the small q can be more exciting than the auto Q, so they didn't show Snelling's final 100 which must have been off the charts as he looked dead coming over the water in 8th or 9th place). 

 

Sadly, he missed that small q by a few hundredths and he'll probably forever wish he had started his kick a bit earlier.  Freshman Rafael  Raap has done a nice job through six decathlon events, setting his collegiate bests in 3 of the events and having bad luck getting headwinds in the 100 and 100H while most everyone else benefited from nice tailwinds (e.g., in the 110H, Raap got a -0.6 while the most beneficial heat was +3.1.  

 

According to  the Big Gold Book, the difference is worth .17).  His 400 was dismal and dead last, though only a few hundredths from his SB, so there's an event he needs to work on along with the 1500 if he ever wants to approach 8000 and become an NCAA scorer.  I'd like to think Coach Schumacher's distance experience will help.  Then again,  Matthew Erickson ran a dismal 800; had he matched his first round at Sacto, he would have moved on.   

 

The 4x100 team did a nice job getting the stick around and set a SB, but finished only 16th out of the 24 teams.  Finally, Micah Williams didn't look great in the 100, but he is the only male Duck that will continue to run, though I wouldn't expect more than 3 points; hopefully, he'll prove me wrong.  Regardless, this is one of the poorest Duck showings in decades.  Only one way to go next year.