Solinsky’s second place good enough for Badgers

By The Standard Staff - 03/11/2007

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Chris Solinsky failed in his bid for a third straight NCAA indoor 3,000-meter title.

Instead, Solinsky had to settle for being part of Wisconsin’s first national championship team.

Solinsky finished second to Northern Arizona’s Lopez Lomong on Saturday, giving Wisconsin a comfortable lead over Texas and Florida State. The Badgers ended the meet with 40 points, and Florida State was second with 35. Arizona State won its first women’s indoor title with 38 points, five more than LSU.

The men’s competition turned in Wisconsin’s favor when Florida State’s Walter Dix stumbled at the start of the 60 final. Dix, who won his second straight 200 indoor title Friday, finished second in the 60 last year. This time, he ended up last and earned only one point for the Seminoles.

Clemson’s Travis Padgett won in 6.56.

That meant Solinsky didn’t have to win to give the Badgers a great chance at the national title. Toward the end, though, Solinsky, wasn’t thinking about the team competition as he ran up front with Lomong. The Northern Arizona runner finished in 7:49.74, almost two seconds ahead of Solinsky.

Wisconsin is the first Big Ten team to win the team indoor title — a Southeastern Conference team had won every year since 1996.

Southern Illinois’ Brittany Riley had the best mark in women’s weight throw history Saturday, breaking her own record with a toss of 83 feet, 10¼ inches. However, the performance will not count as a world record because weight throw records are not recognized by the IAAF.

Riley, a junior from Flossmoor, Ill., broke her mark of 80-7½, set this season, and won by almost 10 feet. In fact, her second-longest toss Saturday was 82-2.

Later, South Carolina’s Natasha Hastings set a collegiate record in the women’s 400, finishing in 50.80. Iowa’s Kineke Alexander, the defending champion, was second in 51.48.

Alexander’s qualifying time Friday was 51.62, and Hastings’ was 51.64. But in the final, everything came together for the South Carolina runner.

Ricardo Chambers of Florida State won the men’s 400 in 45.65.

Two women won their second titles of the meet Saturday. Kerron Stewart of Auburn won the women’s 60 in 7.15 after taking the 200 the previous night. Sally Kipyego of Texas Tech won the 3,000 in 9:02.05 — she won the 5,000 Friday.

Donovan Kilmartin of Texas won his third national championship in the heptathlon. He also won in 2004 and 2006. This year’s event included a world record by Wisconsin’s Joe Detmer, who ran the 1,000 meters in 2:29.42, the fastest mark by anyone in a heptathlon. Detmer, though, finished fifth.

Kilmartin finished with 5,998 points to outlast Jake Arnold of Arizona.

‘‘Four in four years is perfect. I didn’t do too bad,’’ Kilmartin said. ‘‘I’ll definitely take it.’’

Baylor won the men’s 1,600 relay in 3:04.24, the world’s fastest time this year. South Carolina won the women’s race in 3:29.57.

The pentathlon went to Jacquelyn Johnson of Arizona State for the second straight year. She finished with 4,393 points as her team moved toward the national championship.

Arkansas, which has won 42 national titles in track and field and cross country, tied for seventh in the men’s competition, its lowest finish at the NCAA indoor meet since 1981.

Auburn’s Donald Thomas won the high jump with a leap of 7-7¾, more than three inches higher than anyone else’s top jump.

Elouise Rudy of Montana State took the women’s pole vault with a height of 14-1¼. She won a jump off with Natalie Moser of Florida.

Andre Black of Louisville won the triple jump at 53-5½, and Erica McLain was the women’s winner at 45-7¾.

California’s Alysia Johnson took the 800 in 2:03.47. The men’s winner was Ryan Brown of Washington in 1:48.40.

Leonel Manzano of Texas won the men’s mile in 3:59.90, and Shannon Rowbury of Duke was the women’s champion in 4:42.17.

Noah Bryant of Southern California won the shot put at 67-5¼.

NCAA Indoor Results Saturday Finals x-won jump off Men 60 1, Travis Padgett, Clemson, 6.56 seconds. 2, Demi Omole, Wisconsin, 6.57. 3, Jacoby Ford, Clemson, 6.60. 4, Greg Bolden, Florida State, 6.63. 5, Ibrahim Kabia, Minnesota, 6.63. 6, Rubin Williams, Tennessee, 6.67.

400 1, Ricardo Chambers, Florida State, 45.65. 2, Aaron Buzard, Minnesota, 45.86. 3, Quentin Summers, Baylor, 46.07. 4, Michael Bingham, Wake Forest, 46.12. 5, Lesiba Masheto, Illinois, 46.14. 6, Erison Hurtault, Columbia, 46.48.

800 1, Ryan Brown, Washington, 1:48.40. 2, Andrew Ellerton, Michigan, 1:48.55. 3, Kyle Smith, Northern Iowa, 1:49.09. 4, Austin Abbott, Washington, 1:49.65. 5, Jamaal James, LSU, 1:49.69. 6, Paul Harris, Navy, 1:50.02.

3,000 1, Lopez Lomong, Northern Arizona, 7:49.74. 2, Chris Solinsky, Wisconsin, 7:51.69. 3, Josh McDougal, Liberty, 7:55.40. 4, Galen Rupp, Oregon, 7:56.79. 5, Obed Mutanya, Arizona, 7:57.21. 6, Martin Fagan, Providence, 7:57.88.

Mile 1, Leonel Manzano, Texas, 3:59.90. 2, Russell Brown, Stanford, 4:00.84. 3, Stephen Pifer, Colorado, 4:00.93. 4, Garrett Heath, Stanford, 4:00.99. 5, Pablo Solares, Rice, 4:01.24. 6, Scott Overall, Butler, 4:01.25.

1,600 Relay 1, Baylor, 3:04.24. 2, Kentucky, 3:06.34. 3, South Carolina, 3:06.93. 4, LSU, 3:07.11. 5, Florida State, 3:07.35. 6, Northern Iowa, 3:08.01.

High Jump 1, Donald Thomas, Auburn, 7 feet, 7¾ inches. 2, Dusty Jonas, Nebraska, 7-4½. 3, Scott Sellers, Kansas State, 7-3¼. 4, Andra Manson, Texas, 7-3¼. 5, Ryan Fritz, Penn State, 7-3¼. 6, Ed Wright, California, 7-2¼.

Shot Put 1, Noah Bryant, Southern California, 67-5¼. 2, Russ Winger, Idaho, 67-4. 3, Ryan Whiting, Arizona State, 65-7¾. 4, Milan Jotanovic, Manhattan, 64-2¼. 5, Adam Kuehl, Arizona, 63-7¾. 6, Shawn Best, Arizona, 63-6¼.

Triple Jump 1, Andre Black, Louisville, 53-5½. 2, Muhammad Halim, Cornell, 53-3½. 3, Nkosinza Balumbu, Arkansas, 53-1½. 4, Ronald Carter, Long Beach State, 52-4. 5, Ray Taylor, Cornell, 51-10½. 6, Kyle Jenkins, Indiana, 51-9.

Heptathlon 1, Donovan Kilmartin, Texas, 5,998 points. 2, Jake Arnold, Arizona, 5,909. 3, Raven Cepeda, Northern Iowa, 5,864. 4, Josh Hustedt, Stanford, 5,837. 5, Joe Detmer, Wisconsin, 5,761. 6, Chris Helwick, Tennessee, 5,595.

Final Team Standings 1, Wisconsin, 40 points. 2, Florida State, 35. 3, Texas, 34. 4, Stanford, 28. 5, Auburn, 25. 6, Michigan, 23.

Women 60 1, Kerron Stewart, Auburn, 7.15. 2, Courtney Champion, Tennessee, 7.19. 3, Kelly Ann Baptiste, LSU, 7.27. 4, Gloria Asumnu, Tulane, 7.30. 5, Alexandria Anderson, Texas, 7.32. 6, Chaunte Bayne, Texas, 7.33.

400 1, Natasha Hastings, South Carolina, 50.80. 2, Kineke Alexander, Iowa, 51.48. 3, Ashlee Kidd, Georgia Tech, 51.96. 4, Ginou Etienne, Miami, 52.47. 5, Jessica Cousins, Arkansas, 52.95. 6, Nina Gilbert, Louisiana Tech, 53.21.

800 1, Alysia Johnson, California, 2:03.47. 2, Rebekah Noble, Oregon, 2:04.70. 3, Heather Dorniden, Minnesota, 2:04.87. 4, Katie Erdman, Michigan, 2:05.53. 5, Morgan Uceny, Cornell, 2:05.95. 6, Katya Kostetskaya, Texas State, 2:06.10.

3,000 1, Sally Kipyego, Texas Tech, 9:02.05. 2, Shannon Rowbury, Duke, 9:02.73. 3, Arianna Lambie, Stanford, 9:04.81. 4, Michelle Sikes, Wake Forest, 9:13.33. 5, Brie Felnagle, North Carolina, 9:14.21. 6, Amy Hastings, Arizona State, 9:19.31.

Mile 1, Shannon Rowbury, Duke, 4:42.17. 2, Allie Bohannon, UCLA, 4:42.30. 3, Nicole Edwards, Michigan, 4:44.89. 4, Barbara Parker, Florida State, 4:45.97. 5, Jennie Twitchell, Utah State, 4:47.09. 6, Sarah Bowman, Tennessee, 4:47.14.

1,600 Relay 1, South Carolina, 3:29.57. 2, Texas A&M, 3:29.93. 3, LSU, 3:30.26. 4, Penn State, 3:33.39. 5, Louisiana Tech, 3:34.68. 6, TCU, 3:34.75.

Pole Vault 1, x-Elouise Rudy, Montana State, 14-1¼. 2, Natalie Moser, Florida, 14-1¼. 3, Kate Sultanova, Kansas, 14-1¼. 4, Ingrid Kantola, UCLA, 13-9¼. 5, Melinda Owen, Idaho, 13-9¼. 6, Stephanie Irwin, Arkansas, 13-5¼.

Triple Jump 1, Erica McLain, Stanford, 45-7¾. 2, Yvette Lewis, Hampton, 44-8. 3, Michelle Vaughn, Auburn, 43-4¼. 4, Toni Smith, Oklahoma, 42-11½. 5, Nelly Tchayem, Texas-El Paso, 42-11. 6, Cassandra Strickland, California, 42-10¾.

Weight Throw 1, Brittany Riley, Southern Illinois, 83-10¼. 2, Jenny Dahlgren, Georgia, 73-11. 3, Della Clark, Clemson, 68-5. 4, Elisha Hunt, Missouri, 68-2½. 5, Sarah Stevens, Arizona State, 67-9¾. 6, Loren Groves, Kansas State, 67-6¾.

Pentathlon 1, Jacquelyn Johnson, Arizona State, 4,393. 2, Diana Pickler, Washington State, 4,339. 3, Melissa Talbot, Wisconsin, 4,225. 4, Kerstin Greene, Fordham, 4,202. 5, Bettie Wade, Michigan, 4,131. 6, Abbie Stechschulte, West Virginia, 4,085.

Final Team Standings 1, Arizona State, 38. 2, LSU, 33. 3, Tennessee, 30. 4, Georgia, 28. 5, Auburn, 26. 6, Stanford, 24.