Month in Review: Texas A&M Track and Field dominates March

To say the month of March was a success for the Texas A&M Track and Field teams would certainly qualify as an understatement.

What did the end of the indoor season and the beginning of the outdoor slate bring for the Aggies? A myriad of accomplishments, including the ninth National Championship of the Pat Henry era, the first indoor title in school history and an individual performance in Austin that Coach Henry says puts one Aggie among the greatest athletes in the history of the sport.

March began for A&M with the Indoor National Championship in College Station at the McFerrin Indoor Track Stadium. Competing for the title among the likes of Oregon, Florida and Georgia, the Aggies mounted a final day charge that saw the men’s team sitting just two points behind the Ducks and a point-and-a-half behind the Gators going into the final event, the men’s 4x400 relay. Since Oregon did not have a team in the race, it was an SEC showdown between A&M and Florida for the title. 

“With the indoor meet, we felt like we could be in the mix on the men’s side,” said head coach Pat Henry. “When you’re in the mix and everything happens good for you, then you have a great opportunity to win. The meet comes down to everybody having a great day on the same day.” 

Henry turned to an individual who was among those already having a great day, senior Fred Kerley, to lead off the first leg for the Aggies.

Kerley, who had already won the individual 400 M race, was focused on getting A&M out ahead early. 

“I wanted to give my team every inch and get the baton out first,” he said.

While Fred gave the Aggies the lead after the first leg, the Gators would take the next two and were ahead by a few meters when Devin Dixon handed the baton to the younger of the Kerley brothers, Mylik, going into the final leg. Mylik closed the gap going into the final 50 meters of the race to pull away and give the Aggies the title. 

Fred was among the first people there to congratulate his brother after he had clinched the victory.

“It was an exciting moment,” he said. “We did the same thing in high school, but doing it at the next level is amazing.”

Among the other performances that contributed to the men’s title were pole vaulter Audie Wyatt and long jumper Will Williams, who both finished as runners-up in their events. Henry credits a team-first mentality to pushing the Aggies over the top.

“The care that each individual athlete has for each other is a big part of being successful,” he said. “Track always seems to be relegated to: ‘There's a long jumper, there’s a high jumper, and there’s a sprinter.' That’s true, but when they’re all on the same page and all trying to win for the same reason then that makes the event that much more exciting.

“We have that kind of team. Our guys look at themselves as members of a team. When you have that mentality, then everyone has fun doing the absolute best that they can do.”

On the women’s side, The Aggies finished tied for 12th with Ole Miss. Notable performances included the 4x400 relay team of Jazmine Fray, Jaevin Reed, Briyahna Desrosiers and Danyel White finishing third and setting a school record of 3:28.36.

“On the ladies' side, we have a better outdoor team than we do an indoor team,” Henry said.

“I still expected us to be a little bit better than we were indoors. We didn’t do some of the things that I thought we could do on the ladies' side, but then to turn it back around we’re starting our outdoor season and I’m real pleased with where we are.”

Just one week after taking home the title, the Aggies were back to work opening the outdoor season at the Baldy Castillo Invitational at Arizona State. The meet, which did not include team scores, saw some impressive performances for the A&M women. Senior Aaliyah Brown won the 100 M dash by running 11.26 seconds, a new meet record.

“Usually I take the spring break meet not-too-seriously,” said Brown. “But this year I wanted to come out here and make a mark, and that’s what I did. When I heard that the record was from the 1990’s, I thought, ‘I have to go get that record.’”

To go along with Brown’s victory, junior Audrey Malone won the javelin with a throw of 181 feet and 8 inches, freshman Jaevin Brown won the 400 M and freshman Serena Brown finished runner up in the women’s discus. In addition, Senior Allison Ondrusek and junior Carissa van Beek both set personal records in the women’s hammer throw.

On the men’s side, Fred Kerley was back at it again, teaming up with Williams, Jace Comick and Elijah Morrow to win the 4x100 with a time of 39.13 seconds. Morrow would also go on to win the 200 M dash.

The quick turnaround between a national championship and the beginning of a new season may seem foreign to those who don’t follow the sport, but count Coach Henry among those who see it as a positive.

“It’s good,” he said. “You don’t sit around and think about what you just did. You have to think about what’s in front of you.”

The next week saw the Aggies travel to San Antonio to compete in the Roadrunner Invitational, the first scored meet of the outdoor season. This one was all A&M, as the men and women brought home decisive victories. The men won with a total of 231 points to UTSA’s 147.5, and the women were even more dominant, amassing 245 points to Baylor’s 145.

A slew of Aggies brought home victories in this one. On the women’s side, Ondrusek in the hammer throw (another personal best), Shelby Poncik in the javelin, Lajarvia Brown in the triple jump, Ashton Hutcherson in the 2000 M steeplechase, Fray in the 1500 M, White in the 200 M, Ashley Driscoll in the 3000 M, and the 4x100 team of Diamond Spaulding, White, Brenessa Thompson, and Aaliyah Brown all won their events.

The performance has Brown very optimistic about the trajectory of the team moving forward.

“I’m really excited about where both I as an individual am heading and also the team,” she said. “I feel like we’re really progressing each day in practice. We’re learning new things and applying those things to the track meet each week. I feel like we’re in a good place to be contenders to win.”

Men’s victories included Austin Cook in the hammer throw, William Petersson in the javelin, Jeffrey Protho in the triple jump, Robert Grant in the 400 M, Williams in the 100 M, Fred Kerley in the 400 M, Jacob Perry in the 3000 M, and the men’s 4x100 and 4x400 teams.

The final event of March came just down the road in Austin in the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays at Myers Stadium. Texas A&M's history of success at the meet had the team looking for another big weekend in the state capital. What a big weekend it was.

The Aggies won a total of 10 events, five of which were relays, and the men’s team brought home “outstanding team” honors for the third year in a row.

“We have a lot of people that go to Austin to watch us compete,” said Henry. “It could happen right here, but it can’t. They enjoy competing in front of their peers and friends and family. That’s the advantage that they get. We feel like we have great athletes, and when everything is aligned like that, then they have an opportunity to do even better than that.”

The four-day event started on Wednesday, with Lindon Victor competing in the men’s decathlon. His performance over the next two days was nothing short of phenomenal. The senior from Granada proceeded to break Trey Hardee’s collegiate record with a total of 8,472 points on the former Longhorn’s home track.

“I knew I had a chance to get the record because I missed it by nineteen points last year. I told Coach Francique that we should go ahead and get it out of the way (early in the year) to take away any pressure, and he said, ‘Yeah, we’re going to go for it.’ I put together a decent two days, and I was able to get it.”

Victor’s triumph gives him three of the top six decathlon performances in collegiate history, and considering the fact that this is his first decathlon of the year, the sky could be the limit.

“The definition of an athlete is a decathlete,” Henry said. “Run, jump and throw. Not just throw. Not just jump. Run, jump, and throw. That being said, by breaking the collegiate record, he’s the greatest college athlete in the history of the sport.” 

Victor’s record alone would have constituted a great weekend for A&M, but there were still two days to go, and the team took full advantage of their remaining time on campus.

The Aggie women recorded five victories – Lajarvia Brown in the triple jump, the sprint medley team, Serena Brown in the discus, and the 4x200 and 4x100 teams.  Taking home wins on the men’s side – in addition to Victor – were Garrett Cragin in the men’s high jump, Ioannis Kyriazis with the second-longest javelin throw in collegiate history, the sprint medley team and the 4x400 team.

“We did really well,” said Henry. “We say Austin is our home meet. We won ten events and were second in five. We were the outstanding team of the meet, and when you talk about eighty to a hundred institutions being there, we feel really good about where we are right now.”

April is shaping up to be another busy month for Texas A&M. The next few weeks will take the Aggies back to Arizona State for the second time this year, and will also include trips to UCLA, Baylor and LSU. With just four meets remaining until the SEC Championships the second week of May, Coach Henry sees two goals the team needs to meet to stay on track moving forward.

“First of all, it’s to compete hard and leave healthy,” he said. “I think we have that opportunity. If you train hard, then you have a good opportunity to stay healthy. If you stay healthy, you have an opportunity to be consistent. And if you stay consistent, then you have an opportunity to win.” 

Victor thinks that opportunity is well within reach for the Aggies.

“As Coach Henry always says, it’s who is on on that day that’s going to win the national title,” Victor said. “I think the last couple of years we had the best team, but we had some batons dropped. It’s all about who’s on that day. If we’re all clicking on that day, then there’s not a team in America who can beat us.”