Michigan
Rod McCravy Memorial
Road Tests at Indiana, Kentucky Await Michigan Men
1/26/2022 2:52:00 PM | Men's Track & Field
THIS WEEK
Fri-Sat., Jan. 28-29 -- at Kentucky Rod McCravy Memorial (Lexington, Ky.), 10:45 a.m./9:30 a.m.
TV: SEC Network+ (Saturday only) | Live Results | Live Video | Meet Schedule
Fri-Sat., Jan. 28-29 -- at Indiana Relays (Bloomington, Ind.), 6:45 p.m./12:55 p.m.
Live Results | Meet Info
• When to Watch the Wolverines (PDF)
• Social Media: Twitter | Instagram | Facebook
ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The indoor season's first road tests of the 2022 indoor campaign await the University of Michigan men's track and field team this Friday and Saturday (Jan. 28-29) as the Wolverines leave the world-class U-M Indoor Track Building for competitions at Kentucky and Indiana.
With the Big Ten Championships only a month away, the Wolverines will look to begin rounding into postseason form as the sprinters, jumpers and throwers compete at the Kentucky Rod McCravy Memorial and the distance runners race at the Indiana Relays.
A majority of the top athletes from all event groups will be in action in either Lexington or Bloomington, with this weekend expected to be one of two major weekends of regular-season competition remaining on the Wolverines' schedule ahead of the conference meet, Feb. 26-27 at the SPIRE Institute in Geneva, Ohio.
The Indiana Relays will feature the Michigan men's distance corps, where they will get an early Big Ten test against host Indiana, Michigan State, Purdue and Wisconsin, as well as national contenders Butler, North Carolina, Ole Miss and Tennessee.
Multiple-time All-American Devin Meyrer (3,000 meters) is at the head of a group that includes recent school-record breaker Miles Brown (800 meters), All-Americans Tom Brady (3,000 meters) and Christian Hubaker (3,000 meters), and Big Ten medalists Nick Foster (mile) and Joost Plaetinck (3,000 meters). Indoor 2022 standouts Cole Johnson (800 meters) and Henry Johnson (800 meters), and returning Big Ten scorers Will Landowne (3,000 meters), Oli Raimond (3,000 meters), Austin Remick (mile), Thomas Shilgalis (800 meters) and Derrick Simmons (800 meters) are all also expected to feature prominently for the Wolverines.
Michigan's speed and power student-athletes will put themselves to the test at Kentucky, whose McCravy Memorial has become one of the nation's annual preeminent late-January competitions. In addition to being a mini-conference preview with the likes of Maryland, Michigan State, Minnesota, Ohio State, Purdue, Rutgers and Wisconsin all expected to compete, the field also will include such national contenders as host Kentucky, Baylor, Florida and Ole Miss.
Big Ten title contenders Dubem Amene (400 meters), Joshua Zeller (60-meter hurdles) and Cassidy Henshaw (high jump) lead the crew in action at Kentucky, joined by returning Big Ten scorers or finalists Bera Ajala (triple jump), Mason Mahacek (heptathlon) and Job Mayhue (60-meter hurdles), and 2022 standouts Eli Winter (weight throw) and Lawrence Gilliam (400 meters).
Full details on when to watch all of the Wolverine competitors at both competitions will be posted when schedules at both meets are finalized.
Saturday's competition at Kentucky will be streamed live online on the SEC Network+ digital platform, and live results for both Kentucky and Indiana will be available via Primetime Timing. Updates will also be posted throughout the weekend on the official @umichtrack social media channels.
Team Outlook & Notes
• Now under the guidance of Kevin Sullivan in his first year as the director of track and field/cross country for the University of Michigan, the Wolverine men are coming off of a seventh-place finish at the 2021 edition of the Big Ten Indoor Championships. The Wolverines do not return any conference champions, but do have a returning indoor medalist in Nick Foster as well as multiple All-Americans. In total, Michigan returns student-athletes who combined to score 36 of its 52 points.
• Returning All-Americans: Tom Brady (indoor 3,000 meters), Tom Dodd (indoor mile); Christian Hubaker (outdoor steeplechase); Devin Meyrer (cross country, indoor 5,000 meters);
• Returning Individual Big Ten Indoor Championships scorers: Tom Brady (5,000 meters), Tom Dodd (mile), Nick Foster (mile, 3,000 meters), Devin Meyrer (5,000 meters), Mason Mahacek (heptathlon x2), Joshua Zeller (60-meter hurdles x2), Cassidy Henshaw (high jump), Job Mayhue (2019 60-meter hurdles), Will Landowne (2019 3,000 meters)
• Current school record-holders: Devin Meyrer (indoor 5,000 meters), Miles Brown (indoor 600 meters)
• Dubem Amene has put together back-to-back weekends that are unprecedented in the history of the world. He ran 21.29 over 200 meters to win at the Simmons-Harvey Invitational on Jan. 15, then followed it up last Saturday (Jan. 22) with a 1:17.41 win at 600 meters at the Michigan Invitational. Per the World Athletics results database, no other teenager in world history -- Amene is 19 years old, turning 20 in November -- has ever run sub-21.30 and sub-1:17.50 indoors. Another indicator to how fast his 400-meter debut on Saturday could be: he split 45.65 in a thrilling comeback 4x400 relay leg to win at the Simmons-Harvey Invite.
• Amene's stellar 600-meter run came one week after teammate Miles Brown broke the school record with a 1:16.98 run of his own, followed by teammate Cole Johnson in 1:17.98. Brown and Johnson will make their 2022 debuts at 800 meters at Indiana, joining with Henry Johnson who already has run 1:51.24 as a freshman. Among the four Michigan freshmen who are faster in program history are Olympians Nate Brannen, Nick Willis and Sullivan. Brown, a first-year collegian himself, also has a chance to join that list.
• Only one man in the Big Ten has run faster than Joshua Zeller's career-best 7.76 from his only meet of 2022 two weekends ago. He will have as many as three opportunities to improve upon that time and chase the 7.64 school record long held by two-time Olympian Jeff Porter. He will be joined by teammate Job Mayhue, who put together the best meet of his college career with a pair of career-best 7.97 performances last Saturday.
• Cassidy Henshaw opened in the high jump two weekends ago in career-best fashion, becoming the 10th man in school history indoors to make it over seven feet with a third-attempt 2.17m (7 feet, 1.5 inches) clearance that puts him atop the Big Ten this winter and tied for No. 9 in the NCAA. That is the exact lowest height that qualified for the NCAA Indoor Championships last year.
• The Michigan distance corps is opening its campaign in earnest and targeting fast times starting this weekend, but the projected top performers all put in strong opening salvos at the Simmons-Harvey Invitational two weekends ago. Oli Raimond led seven Wolverines under 4:10 in the mile at 4:06.20, including career-best runs from longer-distance specialists Tom Brady (4:07.88), Christian Hubaker (4:08.60) and Devin Meyrer (4:09.54) that bode well for their fitness later in the season.
• Though his performances may have been overshadowed in the early going, heptathlete Mason Mahacek is quietly off to a strong start as he nears his heptathlon debut this weekend. The two-time Big Ten indoor scorer has already lowered his career-best in the 60-meter hurdles by a tenth of a second to 8.84 seconds, extended his shot put personal record by nearly a meter, and has come within two centimeters of his best pole vault at 4.83m (15 feet, 10 inches). He also split just under 50 seconds in the 4x400 relay, in line with his career-best at that distance.
Up Next
Fri-Sat., Feb. 4-5 -- at Meyo Invitational (South Bend, Ind.), TBA
Players Mentioned
