Month in Review: A&M sets blistering pace before SEC Championships

After an historic month of March, the pressure was on Coach Pat Henry and the Texas A&M Track and Field teams to continue their success into April. 

The schedule proved tough, and the Aggies faced multiple ranked teams week in and week out – all on the road. But their performance this past month, which included multiple team victories and new collegiate records, showed why this program – already nine-time national champions – might once again be the best team in the country.

Following a third straight year as the outstanding team of the Texas Relays in Austin, the Aggies got on a plane to Tempe, Arizona, for the second time in a month – this time for the Sun Angel Classic. The meet saw some impressive performances by two Aggie freshmen. 

Serena Brown finished third in the discus with a throw of 179-4 to improve upon a Bahamas national record, while Jaevin Reed’s second-place finish in the 400 M of 51.63 seconds was a personal best and was the best time in the world by anyone under twenty.  Brown and Reed may be freshmen, but Henry expects just as much out of his underclassmen as he does his veterans. 

“When you start, we don’t look at you as a freshman anymore,” he said. “You get through that first meet, you’re no longer a freshman. You’re a track and field athlete, and our team knows that. We usually have three of four freshmen who are impact people.”

Also on the women’s side, senior Allison Ondrusek broke a school record in the hammer throw with a toss of 208-0. The throw surpassed a mark previously set by Brea Garrett. 

For the men, junior Audie Wyatt also set a new A&M record in the pole vault, winning with a mark of 18-8.25. Wyatt continues to build on an impressive season in which he finished second at the indoor national championships, contributing to A&M’s team title.

Still, Henry thinks that Wyatt’s best is yet to come. 

“To jump 18-8, that’s a huge jump, but I think he’s a 19-foot pole vaulter,” he said. “I’ve had a 19-foot pole vaulter before, but I think he has more talent than that guy. Better speed and better everything. He just needs a little bit of time right now."

Other notable performances by the Aggies included former Aggie Donovan Brazier running the fastest time by an American in the 800 M, freshmen Devin Dixon improving to fifth all-time on the A&M list in the same race and a second-place finish in the 400 M hurdles by Robert Grant.

For their performances in Arizona, Grant was named SEC Runner of the Week, while Reed and Dixon were both named Freshmen of the Week.

The next week saw the team jetting off to Los Angeles for the Jim Bush Intercollegiate on the UCLA campus. In their first team-scored meet of April, both the men and women brought home victories. The men ran away with the competition, finishing with 189 points to second-place Alabama’s 103, while the women took home the title with 148 points to the Crimson Tide’s 135.

In Track and Field, where the home team has an advantage in number of athletes who can compete, success on the road can be hard to come by. A&M’s dominant performance in this quality field inspired a great deal of confidence in the team.

“We have pride in that,” said Henry. “In our sport, you’re limited in the number that you can put on an airplane. When you’re at home, you can compete more, so any time you can beat a home team, it’s a great win. It was a great competition, but our people got after them pretty good.”

For the men, the Kerley brothers led the way as they have all season. Mylik ran a personal best 45.48 to win the 400 M while Fred also set a career best 20.45 in his 200 M victory. The Kerleys bring a rare blend of talent and consistency to the table that exists only among the most elite athletes.

“They’re very consistent, and they’re real good,” Henry said. “Fred is running faster than anybody in the world right now, and he’s only run one 400 M this year outdoors.”

 

Also bringing home victories among the A&M men were Sam Hardin in the javelin, Garrett Cragin in the high jump, Jeffrey Protho in the triple jump, Will Williams in the long jump and the 4x100 and 4x400 teams. 

For the women, sophomore Jazmine Fray continued her impressive season with a 2:01.43 victory in the 800 M that set a school record. Fray set the collegiate indoor record back in February with a time of 2:00.69.

“She’s done some tremendous work this year, and she’s a very unusually talented young lady,” Henry said. “She’s run right at 51 seconds in the 4x400, she runs a great mile and she’s our school record holder in the 800 M. She’s got lots of talent.” 

Joining Fray with victories were Ondrusek in the hammer throw, Shelby Poncik in the javelin, Briyahna Desrosiers in the 400 M, Brenessa Thompson in the 200 M and the 4x100 and 4x400 teams. 

Next was a trip up the road to Waco for the Michael Johnson Invitational. Despite no team scores being recorded, the Aggies were once again the most impressive team at the meet. The team posted 14 combined victories on Saturday.

The strength of the team to date has been in relays and throwing events. On this day, it was the distance runners' time to shine.

Jacob Perry and Kelsie Warren won the men’s and women’s 5000 M races. In the 3000 M steeplechase, Amelia McElhinney was the top finisher on the women’s side, while Raymond Gonzelez – running unattached – and Sam Erickson finished first and second on the men’s side. Finally, Katie Watson won the women’s 1500 M, and Jon Bishop finished second in the men’s race.

“To win a track meet, the sprinters can’t win,” said Henry. “The jumpers can’t win. The distance can’t win. It takes all of us. I think we have more distance runners understanding what their contribution can be and how they contribute to the total effort of the team. We didn’t have a distance runner score in the indoor championships, and we may not at outdoor. But we have a group that’s working hard to try to get to that spot.” 

In addition to the solid outing by the distance runners, the usual suspects continued to shine. Fred Kerley ran the 400 M in 44.60 – the second fastest time in the world to date – to claim another victory.

The Aggie men brought home seven additional victories; Williams in the long jump, Jeff Bartlett in the discus, Morrow in the 100 M, Jace Comick in the 200 M, Dixon in the 800 M, Ilolo Izu in the 400 M hurdles and the 4x100 team.

The other A&M women’s victories were Ondrusek in the hammer throw and Thompson in the 100 M. 

A&M wrapped up the regular season at the Inaugural SEC Relays in Baton Rouge. The meet featured ten of the fourteen SEC schools, including six ranked in the top 25 on both the men’s and the women’s side. Both Aggie squads entered as the top-ranked teams in the nation.

“With those rankings, I’m glad they do some of that stuff, but our sport is one day,” said Henry. “You have to do it on that day and maybe you get another day to do it. It’s good for them to say nice things about us, but we have to be able to go on the day it counts.”

 

A&M didn’t disappoint, winning the combined men’s and women’s scored total with 136 points to LSU’s 115.

The meet started off in record-breaking fashion for A&M with the men’s and women’s sprint medleys.

The women’s team of Diamond Spaulding, Thompson, Reed and Fray broke the collegiate record by over two full seconds with a time of 3:39.04.

Not ten minutes later, the men’s squad of Morrow, Dixon, and the Kerley brothers proceeded to break another collegiate record with a time of 3:11.94.

“I think our group was focused on what they were going to do before the meet ever started,” said Henry. “We knew we were going to run fast, but we had to execute. We had to get the hand-offs right. We knew that we had the people to do the things that we did.”

Those events set the tone for the weekend. Brown extended her Bahamas national record in the discus with a throw of 186-6 and was honored as the SEC Freshman of the Week. Other field event winners included Audie Wyatt in the pole vault, Jacob Perry in the 5000 M, Garrett Cragin in the high jump and Jeffrey Protho in the triple jump. 

In relay events, the men’s 4x800 team and the men’s and women’s 4x400 teams also brought home victories. The men’s 4x400 team closed out the competition by running in 3:00.74, the fastest time in the world at any level of competition this year, a mark that made even the international community pay attention.

“The weekend we ran the SEC Relays, the World Relays was going on in The Bahamas,” Henry said. “You’re assigned a lane based on the time that you have. The United States used Texas A&M’s mile relay time to get the preferred lane. And they still didn’t run as fast as we did.” 

This week the team travels to Columbia, South Carolina, for the SEC Outdoor Championships. The Aggies will look to continue to build on their history of success. Since joining the SEC, both the men’s and women’s teams have finished no worse than third place at the outdoor championship. 

This year's field showcases the unusual depth among SEC teams this season. The women’s top 10 consists of eight SEC members, while the men’s includes five. A&M remains ranked number one in both polls, so this level of competition isn’t something Coach Henry thinks his team will shy away from.

“We can’t worry about what anybody else does,” he said. “We've had about eight rehearsals. You should have learned something in each of those rehearsals, and now it’s about doing what you do and doing it right and having as many do it right on the same day as we can.”

The top-ranked Aggies will feature three Bowerman award finalists: Fred Kerley, Lindon Victor and Ioannis Kyriazis. The Aggies join the 2011 Florida Gators as the only other team in history to achieve such a mark.

“That’s huge,” Henry said. "The Bowerman is a huge award in our sport. For us, we’re extremely pleased with that on the men’s side. But before the year is over, I think we’ll have a lady in that group too.”

The SEC Championships start this Thursday at the University of South Carolina. The meet begins Friday and will be televised on SEC Network+.