By Jack Pfeifer
EUGENE, Ore. – You know a sprinter has adapted to the bracing climate of the Pacific Northwest when, on a rainy day in the low 50s, she says, “This is a pretty good day for running, really!”
That was the University of Oregon freshman, English Gardner, less than a year out of Eastern Senior (Voorhees, N.J.) and 12 days after running that stunner 11.03 to win the Pac-10 100. On Thursday evening here at the NCAA Division I West Regional meet on the University of Oregon campus, Gardner won Heat I in 11.39 to qualify to Friday’s quarterfinal round. She broke quickly to the front and cruised. Why run so hard in the first round? “It’s hard to coast in the 100 meters,” she said.
Fourth in the same race, and advancing as a time qualifier, was Geronne Black, sophomore from nearby Portland State and graduate of Robeson H.S., Brooklyn. Black ran 11.70. It took 11.75 to advance.
In the quarterfinals, the top 12 finishers will move on to the NCAA Finals, to be held two weeks from now in Des Moines, Iowa. Qualifying similar to this is also taking place this week at the East Regional in Bloomington, Ind.
In the women’s 400 hurdles, two old rivals from Penn Relays days, Ryann Krais of Kansas State and Dalilah Muhammad of USC, advanced from Round I. Kraiss won her heat in 57.51, the 3rd-fastest time of the day, while Muhammad was a narrow 2nd to Kori Carter of Stanford in hers, 58.39-58.51.
Krais, a two-time Penn Relays 400H champion while a student at Methacton H.S. in the Philadelphia area, is in her first season at K-State after two disappointing years at UCLA. She has already qualified for the NCAA championships in the heptathlon, and will be competing in the 100 hurdle prelims here on Friday as well.
“I grew up in Pennsylvania,” Krais said, referring to the raw conditions. “I ran in the rain all the time.
“My job here was to get to the next round, and to execute my race. This is the time to practice.”
Krais was Big 12 Conference champion in the IH. “The ideal plan,” she said, “will be to get to the NCAAs in the 400 hurdles and the heptathlon. Making it in the 100 hurdles? That would be a stretch.”
Muhammad, the Cardozo H.S. graduate and now in her junior season at SC, led most of the way in her heat. “I just wanted to get to the next round,” she said. “I’m a little under the weather today. This is all about getting to nationals.”
The woman who beat Muhammad at the Pac-10 meet two weeks ago, Turquoise Thompson of UCLA, had the day’s fastest time, 56.84.
New Yorker Phyllis Francis (McAuley, Brooklyn), the Oregon freshman, faded in her heat of the 800 and finished 7th in Heat I in 2:11.57, well back of the time needed to qualify. But another runner with Eastern roots, Brittany Ogunmokun, a sophomore at Baylor, advanced in the 800 with the 3rd-fastest time of the day, 2:06.68 for 2nd place in Heat III.
For Ogunmokun – who turned 21 on Thursday – Baylor is already her third college. “I went to Temple out of high school,” said Ogunmokun, who ran on one of the star-studded squads at Eleanor Roosevelt H.S. in Maryland. “Then I decided to switch majors, to physical therapy, so I transferred to Seton Hall.
“Then Seton Hall dropped track, so I left again.” One of her friends at Seton Hall was looking into Baylor, and he mentioned the school to her. “I said, ‘Where’s Baylor?’ He said, ‘It’s in Texas.’ So I went down to visit, I loved it there, I signed, and here I am.”
Another 800 runner with New Jersey roots, Marielle Hall, freshman from Haddonfield, also failed to advance, running 2:16.35.
In the 1,500, the Oregon freshman Megan Patrignelli (Monroe-Woodbury, NY) finished 8th in her heat, in 4:25.60, and failed to advance, though she missed by just one second. Her Oregon teammates, the sophomores Becca Friday and Jordan Hasay, both advanced. In the men’s 15, Oregon’s Matthew Centrowitz won his heat in a controlled 3:47. His teammate A.J. Acosta also advanced, but with the slowest qualifying time of the day (3:48.89). Arkansas also advanced two milers, Duncan Phillips and Dorian Ulrey.
In field events, Casey DiCesare, the UCLA senior from Irvington, N.Y., failed to advance, clearing 16-0 ¾.