The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
03.09.2019 | Track & Field / Cross Country
The Longhorns continued their program improvement as both sides finished Top 13 at NCAA Indoor Championships.
NOTES
RESULTS: MEN | WOMEN
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - The University of Texas Track & Field program saw both the men and women finish in the Top 15 for the first time since the 2016 at the 2019 NCAA Indoor Championships over the weekend.
After a 51st-place finish a season ago with one point, the women finished tied for 12th with 14 points. The men finished tied for 13th with 16 points. While the improvement was significant across the board, first-year head coach Edrick Floréal knows that this program is capable of reaching even greater heights moving forward.
"Today wasn't as we expected," Floréal said. "I thought that both teams should've scored more than 20 points, and the women would've if not for some bad breaks with Kynnedy Flannel. We have too many talented athletes and we know that Texas is significantly better than we showed. We are disappointed, but we need to get a little tougher and learn to ride the momentum. When we get people to buy in and totally committed to the process of success, we will see results. In the end, the leadership happens in the locker room and we need people to believe in themselves and change their mindset. We need to go from being a great conference team to being a great team, period."
After Ashtin Zamzow scored six points for the women in the pentathlon on Friday, Teahna Daniels added eight points with a second-place finish in the 60 meters. Her time of 7.181 narrowly edged out both Florida State's Ka'Tia Seymour (7.183) and UNLV's Destiny Smith-Barnett (7.188).
"I'm really blessed and excited," Daniels said of her runner-up finish. "I had a really rough start to my indoor season - getting injured and not being able to practice for almost a month. To come back to where it all started and get second, it's a blessing. It shows that I have a lot more to come."
The Longhorns appeared to score eight more points in the 200 meters a short time later, as Kynnedy Flannel ran what appeared to be a 22.70 to finish in second. That would've given the Longhorns 22 points for the meet, which would've been an impressive sixth-place team finish. However, Flannel was ruled to have committed a lane violation on the final turn and was disqualified. The women's 4x400m Relay team closed out the day with a 10th-place finish, moving up two spots from the seed they entered the meet at, with a time of 3:34.86.
The men entered the day with eight points after Tripp Piperi's second-place finish in the shot put on Friday. Sam Worley got the Longhorns' scoring off to a good start, taking sixth in the mile for three points. John Burt, competing in the first NCAA Indoors meet in his career, placed fifth in the 60m hurdles for four points. Last year's national champion in the triple jump, O'Brien Wasome placed eighth after battling through an injury in recent weeks leading up to the NCAA meet that caused him to miss the Big 12 Championships. Unfortunately, in the 3000m, school-record holder Alex Rogers would finish 14th after being tripped up early in the race. After the fall, he started to chip away at the field from approximately 20 meters back. Rogers didn't give up, eventually passing two competitors for his placement.
The Longhorns begin outdoor season next weekend at the UTSA Invitational. The Horns will host the 92nd Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays in a few weeks, Wednesday, March 27 - Saturday, March 30. The outdoor season concludes in Austin this season at Mike A. Myers Stadium, as UT will play host to the NCAA Outdoor Championships June 5-8.
