William and Mary to Host CAA Track and Field Championships This Weekend

04/17/08 7:06PM

WILLIAMSBURG - The Colonial Athletic Association Track and Field Championships return to William and Mary this weekend for the first time since 1998, bringing seven men's teams and nine women's squads to Williamsburg in search of NCAA, Olympic Trials, and Olympic qualifying marks.

Meet Information, including schedules and live results, can be found at the following webpage:

2008 CAA CHAMPIONSHIPS

The Meet
This is the 19th year for both the men's and women's track championships, and the third year the championships have been held at W&M. The winners of each event, except the 10,000m races and decathlon and heptathlon, earn automatic bids to the NCAA East Regional. All national championship qualifiers (excepting those four events) must advance from the regional competitions. All CAA Champions also earn an automatic berth at the ECAC/IC4A Championships, which accepts competitors from every school in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic to crown an East Coast Champion.

Predicting the Meet
Looking at the entry sheets and predicting the outcome of each event, the consensus among the experts is that it will be a tight three-team race for both the men's and women's trophies. On the men's side, William and Mary, VCU, and UNC Wilmington will be battling and scrapping for every point, while on the women's side, the fight looks to be between William and Mary, Northeastern, and James Madison. In both races, the point spread between first and third could be as few as six to eight points.

CAA Teams in the National Rankings
In the latest U.S. Track and Field Coaches Association power rankings, which reward teams for having NCAA Regional qualifiers and rank athletes according to their likelihood of progressing to the NCAA Championships, the CAA has four men's teams and five women's teams represented.

Men's Ratings (Out of all Division I teams)
87. Georgia State
126. William and Mary
158. George Mason
176. Virginia Commonwealth

Women's Ratings
103. Towson
122. Georgia State
142. William and Mary
184. James Madison
187. Northeastern

The CAAs at W&M
The College has hosted the CAA Championships twice before, in 1994 and in 1998. At the 1994 men's meet, conference records in the Triple Jump and 400m dash were established as George Mason outscored William and Mary 86-69 for the conference title. The Tribe had three titlists that year, with Todd Doughty claiming the 110m hurdles, Scott Miller winning the 3,000m steeplechase, and Steve Swift winning the 5,000m to start an unfathomable 14-year stretch where a W&M man has won the 5,000m every year, a streak that is yet to be broken.

In 1998, William and Mary again took second in the team race, 124-151.5 behind UNC Wilmington. Tribe champions Matt Moran (in the steeplechase) and Matt Lane (in the 5,000m) each set meet records that year, and were joined at the top of the podium by Anders Christiansen in the 800m, Tyler Steel in the hammer throw, and George Ashton in the 400m hurdles, the first of three consecutive gold medals for Ashton.

On the women's side, 1994 saw the team title go to George Mason with a 112-51.5 victory over East Carolina. William and Mary was third with 51 points, and boasted a two-event champion in Marcie Homan (1,500m and 3,000m run), as well as high jump champ Lisa Rayner, who was named Performer of the Meet. Meet records were set in the discus and the 800m run.

In 1998, George Mason won the last of their nine titles, 179-123 over William and Mary. It was the first year that the women's pole vault was contested, with the Tribe's Susan Larson taking gold with a jump of 10' 6" (3.20m). Meet records were set by George Mason in the 4x400m relay, and by the Patriot's Michelle Ballentine in the 800m with a time of 2:09.12, which is still the fastest time in championships history. Along with Larson, W&M had champions in the shot put (Dania Douglas) and in the 5,000m run (Jackie Kerr).

Notable Firsts
This weekend will mark the first time the women's heptathlon has ever been contested at William and Mary in over 30 years of women's track and field meets. In fact, five events that are on the docket of events have never been run under the CAA banner at Zable stadium. The men's and women's 10,000m races were not championship events from 1994-1998, the decathlon was first held in 2000, and the heptathlon and women's 3,000m steeplechase were both first held in 2001.

Chasing the Century Mark
The men's track team has won 94 individual championships in the ECAC South/CAA Championships, and with some hard work this weekend, could reach the century mark. The team has averaged six titlists per year over the last five seasons, including six last year and eight in both 2003 and 2004, when W&M won the team title.

The pre-meet form chart right now projects the Tribe as winning five gold medals, and in four more events the top W&M performer is ranked second or third.

Hard-Hat Zone: Watch out for falling records
The women's team has mounted an all-out assault on the record books this season. In total, there have been 16 school-record performances and 16 freshman-record performances since the year started on November 30. What's even more astonishing is freshman phenom Katie Guevel's line: seven school records and 14 freshman records.

Katie Guevel – Seven school records, 14 freshman records
Abby Lemon – Three school records
Allie Lewis – Three school records (one relay leg)
Emily Anderson – Two school records (one relay leg)
Alyssa Gaeto – One school record
Nicole Kazuba – One school record
Dana Harvey – One school record (relay leg)
Ashley Madonick – One school record (relay leg)
Betsy Graney – Two freshman records

Athletes of the Week
Since the outdoor season started on March 14, W&M athletes have earned nine athlete of the week honors from the CAA.

March 18 – Katie Guevel, Field Athlete of the Week
April 1 – Katie Guevel, Track Athlete of the Week, Nicole Kazuba, Field Athlete of the Week, Alex Heacock, Field Athlete of the Week
April 8 – Betsy Graney, Co-Track Athlete of the Week, Harry Miller, Co-Track Athlete of the Week, Nicole Kazuba, Field Athlete of the Week, Cam Shriver, Field Athlete of the Week
April 15 – Katie Guevel, Track Athlete of the Week

East Coast Champions
At the ECAC and IC4A Indoor Championships at the beginning of March, two Tribe athletes walked away with gold medals. Sophomore Emily Anderson won the women's 3,000m race in a personal-best 9:26.33, and junior Cam Shriver won the men's high jump with a career-best jump of 6' 10.75".

Defending Champions
The women's team returns four athletes who are defending CAA titles from last year, along with a fifth who is a past CAA Champion. In 2007, Nicole Kazuba won the pole vault, Emily Anderson won the 1,500m, Emily Gousen won the 10,000m (with a meet record), and Kate Willever won the 3,000m steeplechase; all four will be competing those same events this weekend. Additionally, Brenna Blevins redshirted last season, but set the then-meet record in the heptathlon in 2006, and was part of the title-winning 4x400m relay team in 2005.

The men's team has one returning champion after the graduation of a large senior class in 2007. Alex Heacock won the javelin by over 25 feet last year, the seventh time in the past eight years that a Tribe athlete had won the event.