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May 24, 2007
The Virginia men’s and women’s track teams will compete this weekend at the NCAA East Regional in Gainesville, Fla. with designs of advancing to the NCAA Championships in Sacramento in June. The Cavaliers will send 16 participants to Percy Beard Track and Field at Florida, including All-Americans Kara Scanlin, Erin Crawford and Tomika Ferguson, school record holders Yemi Ayeni and Kellen Blassingame, and nationally-ranked Jan Foerster to the meet in Gainesville. Individuals will automatically qualify with a top-five finish in their respective events; the national fields will be filled out through at-large selections based on ranked performances during the season.
Crawford and teammate Ayla Smith will both compete in the 400 intermediate hurdles on Friday; Crawford is the school record holder while Smith ranks seventh all-time in Virginia history. Crawford set the school record with her All-American performance in 2006. Another pair of teammates competing is Janine Ricci and Stephanie Garcia, both of whom will run in the steeplechase on Saturday night. Ricci ran the nation’s then-fastest time in March and is currently ranked in the top-30 nationally; she has the third-fastest time in school history while Garcia ranks fourth all-time at Virginia. Teammates Tomika Ferguson and Katie Tershel will both look to advance in the long jump; Ferguson holds the school record with a 42′ 11″ and earned All-American honors indoors while Tershel also ranks in the top-10 in school history. These two will compete in the triple on Saturday night while Ferguson will also jump in the long jump competition on Friday.
A group of weight throwers will also compete on the women’s side as first-year Meghan Briggs, who already ranks in the top-five all-time at Virginia in the javelin, will throw on Friday in that event; the ACC runner-up currently ranks 15th in the East. Teammate Alexa Manning will throw the shot put on Friday as well; she also ranks in the top-five all-time in school history. Amy Bilmanis, who earned All-ACC honors in the discus and ranks fifth all-time at Virginia, will throw on Saturday. All-American Kara Scanlin, who has already qualified for the NCAA meet in the 10K, will run in the 5K after posting Virginia’s ninth-best time in school history earlier this year. The women’s 4x400m relay team will compete on Saturday night as well.
Teammates Kevin McHale and Andrew Jesien will both compete in the 1500m run on Friday; McHale, who earned All-ACC honors earlier this year, is ranked 15th in the East region. Fellow distance runner Jan Foerster will run in his specialty, the steeplechase, on Saturday night. Foerster ranks second in the east and 13th nationally; he is the ACC runner-up in that event and also was the ACC Champion in the 5K in 2007.
Reuben Jones will compete in both short sprints after winning three gold medals at the IC4A Championships; Jones won the 100 and 200 and was on the winning 4x100m relay team at IC4As. In the process he moved up to rank second all-time in the 100m and fourth all-time in the 200m at Virginia. He will run in both events on Friday. Kellen Blassingame returns to compete in the 400m after a year’s absence; he holds the school record in the 400m dash and will run that event on Friday as well.
ACC and IC4A Champion Yemi Ayeni will look to advance to the NCAA Championships after a phenomenal regular season; he smashed the school record in both the shot put and the discus in 2007 and is ranked 10th nationally in the discus. He broke the school record three times in the discus, showing remarkable consistency throughout the season. He will throw the disc on Friday and compete in the shot put on Saturday.
The NCAA Championships will be held at Sacramento State starting June 6.