The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
NCAA Outdoor Championships
Davis wins NCAA long jump title as No. 4/7 Track and Field continues NCAA Championships
06.10.2021 | Track & Field / Cross Country
Tara Davis became the first woman in program history to win an NCAA Outdoor long jump title and completed her indoor-outdoor sweep of the crowns.
EUGENE, Ore. – No. 4/7 Texas Track and Field's Tara Davis won the NCAA Outdoor long jump national championship on Thursday, completing her indoor and outdoor sweep of the NCAA's long jump crowns. Davis the first Texas woman to win an NCAA long jump title outdoors.
The Agoura Hills, Calif. native overcame her toughest test of the outdoor season to win her second NCAA title. She trailed Georgia's Jasmine Moore entering the fifth round, where Davis would jump her title-winning mark of 6.70m/21-11.75. Davis held onto her lead and won the title despite a fifth-round improvement to 6.65m/21-10 for Moore and a 6.68m/21-11 jump from Texas A&M's Tyra Gittens in the sixth and final round.
Davis' victory marks the ninth time a Texas woman or relay team swept the NCAA's indoor and outdoor titles in an event. Destinee Hooker was the last to do so, sweeping the NCAA high jump titles in 2009. The triumphant performance also caps a historic season for Davis, as she concludes the campaign with 12 of the 20 longest outdoor jumps in school history, and four the six longest in collegiate history. Her 2021 campaign saw her break both the indoor and outdoor collegiate long jump records, doing so at the NCAA Indoor Championships (6.93m/22-9) and at the Texas Relays (7.14m/23-5.25).
In her series on Thursday, Davis recorded four of the top-20 jumps on Texas record. She soared a winning 6.70m/21-11.75 (T-No. 9), 6.69m/21-11.5 (No. 11), 6.52m/21-4.75 (No. 17) and 6.51m/21-4.24 (No. 18).
Along with Davis' national title, Texas advanced four entries to finals on Saturday. Those four finalists came in the 200-meter dash, the 400-meter dash and both the 4x100-meter and 4x400-meter relays.
The 4x100-meter team was the first to advance, clocking a 43.52 to move on as a time qualifier. The quartet of Chanel Brissett, Kevona Davis, Rhasidat Adeleke and Kynnedy Flannel won the Big 12 title last month in Manhattan, Kan. and will get a shot at a national title this weekend.
On the bookend of Thursday's competition was the 4x400-meter relay, where the team of Serenity Douglas, Kennedy Simon, Brooke Jaworski and Stacey Ann Williams took second in their heat at 3:31.09 to clinch a bid to the final.
Sandwiched between the relays, Kevona Davis and Stacey Ann Williams qualified in the 200-meter and 400-meter dashes, respectively. Davis clocked a 23.00 in her heat to qualify on time, while Williams' 51.75 was good for second in her heat and an automatic qualifying bid.
Texas' men tallied five points with the conclusion of the decathlon, thanks to a 7,697-point effort in the 10-event competition from outdoor freshman Leo Neugebauer.
Neugebauer scored 3,592 points in the final five events on Thursday. He opened the day by talling 833 points with a time of 15.14 in the 110-meter hurdles. Following that was an 824-point performance in the discus throw, where he best effort flew 47.77/156-8. Neugebauer added 822 points in the pole vault (4.71m/15-5.5) and 503 points in the javelin (44.16m/144-10) before closing out the decathlon with a personal-best 4:51.45 (610 pts) in the 1,500-meter run.
On Wednesday, the German international opened the decathlon with an 830-point effort in the 100-meter dash, clocking 11.14 into a -0.6 headwind. He followed it by scoring 847 points in the long jump (7.14m/23-5.25) and a 799-point throw in the shot put (15.15m/49-8.5). His marks in the first three competition helped him climb into the top five of the leaderboard, going from 15th to 11th to fifth.
Neugebauer added a personal-best clearance of 2.04m/6-8.25 in the high jump to score another 840 points. He closed out the decathlon's opening day by clocking a 50.56 in the 400-meter dash, adding another 789 points to his score.
He is the latest in a long line of Longhorns to earn All-America honors in the decathletes. That group also includes national champions Trey Hardee (2005) and Johannes Hock (2013).
The Texas men return to center stage in pursuit of the program's first national title on Friday, with competition beginning at 6:30 p.m. CT. The women's heptathlon is also set to commence on Friday, beginning at 2 p.m. CT. Freshman Kristine Blazevica will represent the Longhorns in that multi-event field.
NCAA Outdoor National Champions
Women's Long Jump: Tara Davis
NCAA Outdoor Championships Scorers
Women's Long Jump: Tara Davis (10 pts / 1st place)
Men's Long Jump: Steffin McCarter (4 pts / 5th place)
Men's Shot Put: Tripp Piperi (8 pts / 2nd place)
Players Mentioned
