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Virginia Set to Compete at 2011 NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championship
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INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. – Seniors Adams Abdulrazaaq and Marcus Robinson have earned at-large bids to the 2011 NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships, as announced by the NCAA Monday night. The duo will join Virginia’s distance medley relay of junior All-American Morgane Gay, senior Ayla Smith, senior Lyndsay Harper and redshirt senior All-American Stephanie Garcia at the national meet, hosted this weekend by Texas A&M. Events are scheduled to take place at Gilliam Indoor Track Stadium on March 11-12.
ESPN3.com will stream the championships live from 3:55-8:40 p.m., on Friday and at 5-7:50 p.m., on Saturday. The NCAA.com will stream supplemental coverage on Friday from 10 a.m.-3:55 p.m., and on Saturday from noon until 4:55 p.m. Live results can be found on VirginiaSports.com.
Abdulrazaaq earned an at-large bid in the 60m hurdles to become the first-ever Cavalier to advance to the NCAA Indoor Championships in a hurdle event. The Highland Springs, Va., native broke his own school record in the 60m hurdles at the Hokie Invitational on Jan. 21, winning the event in 7.75. In addition, he advanced to the finals of the hurdles at all four ACC Indoor Championships, finishing runner-up this year to earn his third-straight all-conference accolade in the event. This will mark his first appearance at the NCAA Championships.
The preliminary round of the 60m hurdles is scheduled for Friday at 5:45 p.m. ET. The eight-competitor finals are scheduled for Saturday at 6:30 p.m.
Robinson, the 2011 ACC Champion in the triple jump, has become the third Cavalier in program history to advance to NCAAs in the event, and the first to do so since Greg Byers qualified in 1984. The Richmond, Va., native currently leads the ACC and is ranked 13th nationally with his jump of 52′ 8″ from the conference meet. This will mark Robinson’s first trip to the NCAA Indoor Championships.
The final round of the triple jump is scheduled to begin on Saturday at 5:30 p.m. ET.
Virginia’s DMR squad will open competition at the national meet on Friday at 9:20 p.m. ET. The squad shattered the all-time program record last weekend, running 10:59.33 at Columbia’s Last Chance Meet. UVa, the 2010 and 2011 ACC Champions, will head to NCAAs as the No. 2 ranked relay team, behind only Villanova – who won the title at Columbia last weekend with a time of 10:56.12.
This will mark the first time in program history that Virginia has fielded a women’s distance medley relay at the NCAA Indoor Championships, while it is also the first time Gay, Smith, Harper and Garcia have qualified for the indoor national meet.