Michigan
NCAA Indoor Championships
Wolverine Women Set for NCAA Indoor Championships
3/8/2022 8:30:00 AM | Women's Track & Field
THIS WEEK
Fri-Sat., March 11-12 -- at NCAA Indoor Championships (Birmingham, Ala. / Birmingham CrossPlex)
TV: ESPN3 | Meet Central | Live Results
Friday: 6:45 p.m. CST | Live Streams: Track / Field
Saturday: 7:30 p.m. CST | Live Stream
• Social Media: Twitter | Instagram | Facebook
ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- A pair of school record holders and Big Ten champions will represent the University of Michigan women's track and field team this Friday and Saturday (March 11-12) at the NCAA Indoor Championships to be held inside the confines of the Birmingham CrossPlex in Birmingham, Ala.
Three-time Big Ten 600-meter champion and two-time indoor relay All-American Aurora Rynda will battle for the national title at 800 meters in her individual debut at indoor nationals, and former Big Ten pole vault champion Jessica Mercier will look to once again raise the bar on her school record.
They are set to compete in what may be the highest-quality NCAA Indoor Championships ever assembled. In 14 of the 17 events on the championships schedule -- including both the 800 meters and the pole vault -- the seed time or mark for the lowest-seeded entrant is the best-ever final qualifying time or mark in meet history.
Mercier will be up first at 6:45 p.m. in the pole vault final, with Rynda following an hour later at 7:45 p.m. in the semifinals of the 800 meters. Should she advance to Saturday's final, Rynda would compete at 7:30 p.m.
Men-only sessions will precede the women's competitions on both days, featuring Michigan entrants Dubem Amene (400 meters), Joshua Zeller (60-meter hurdles), and Cole Johnson and Miles Brown (800 meters), as well as the distance medley relay.
The team champion will be determined based on which school accumulates the most points from the results of each event on the track and in the field. Event champions will garner 10 points for their teams, with diminishing point values awarded to each successive finisher through eighth place. Runners-up will earn eight points, third-place finishers earn six, with one less point awarded for each place through eighth (10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1).
In addition to battling for national titles, all student-athletes will be in contention for All-America honors from the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA). The top eight finishers in each event will be bestowed first-team honors, and finishers nine through 16 will be named second-team All-Americans. Those who do not finish, are disqualified or otherwise do not record a result will be named honorable mention.
The subscription ESPN3 streaming service will carry two feeds of the championships on each of the two days, with one dedicated to track events and the other to field events. Live results will be available through Flash Results, and updates will be posted throughout the day on the official social media channels of Michigan track and field.
Entry Details
Women's Pole Vault - Jessica Mercier (No. 15 seed)
Final - Friday, 6:45 p.m. CST
• Mercier will be looking to bounce back from a no-height performance at the Big Ten Indoor Championships in which she did not clear her opening bar of 3.87m (12-8.25). Just two weeks prior at the Windy City Invitational, she twice broke the school record en route to a 4.36m (14-3.5) clearance that ranks her No. 4 in Big Ten indoor history.
• One of her coaches, volunteer assistant Kiley (Tobel) Bastien, is the only other Wolverine woman to have competed at the NCAA Indoor Championships in the pole vault. She earned first-team All-America honors with a eighth-place finish at 4.20m (13-9.25) in 2012, and cleared that same height for 15th place and second-team honors in 2014.
• A progression of bar heights has not yet been announced, but it will be the most aggressive progression Mercier has faced in her career. The opening height in each of the past three seasons has been set at 4.16m (13-7.75), with subsequent 4.26m (13-11.75) and 4.36m bars and additional five-centimeter rises after that.
Women's 800 Meters - Aurora Rynda (No. 6 seed)
Semifinals - Friday, 7:45 p.m. CST / Final* - Saturday, 7:30 p.m. CST
* Top three finishers in each of the two semifinal heats plus the next two fastest times advance to the final
• Rynda is coming off one of the most impressive performances in school history as she clocked 1:26.50 to win her third career Big Ten Indoor Championships 600-meter title. The time not only chopped .55 of a second off her school record, it is also the fastest time in Big Ten history, the No. 3 time in collegiate history, the 2022 world leader, the fastest time in Canadian history, and No. 26 on the all-time world list.
• The only two women in collegiate history who have run faster are Olympians Athing Mu and Raevyn Rogers, both of whom won The Bowerman Trophy as collegiate track and field's top female student-athlete. Rynda received votes for the first time in her career on the latest watch list for The Bowerman Trophy.
• Rynda also set the school record for the 800-meter distance last month with a 2:02.89 that ranks third-fastest in Big Ten history. She topped multiple-time NCAA champion and Olympian Geena Gall for that record. The overall Big Ten record, held by Wisconsin's Amy Wickus at 2:01.65 since 1994, could also be in reach. Rynda owns an outdoor career best of 2:01.35 from last year's NCAA East Preliminaries. That outdoor PR is narrowly surpassed by only two other women in the field.
• She was also a member of the Big Ten champion distance medley relay squad that earlier this month ran 10:59.46, but was ultimately shut out of the NCAA Championships in what has become the deepest-ever year in that event. Michigan is the second-fastest team in collegiate history to not make the national meet, behind only Utah's squad that was the first team out this year. While she will not have the opportunity to go for a third career All-America honor in the event, she will now have the potential opportunity to be fresher than some of her other opponents in a potential final. The top two seeds -- Lindsey Butler of Virginia Tech and Shafiqua Maloney of Arkansas -- are also key legs of the No. 2 and No. 1 distance medley relay teams, respectively. They are also the only two women who have run faster than 2:02 this winter at 800 meters. Of the remaining three women seeded ahead of Rynda at No. 6, all are within .05 of a second of her seed time.
• She is looking to become the sixth Michigan woman to earn All-America honors in the event, and the first since Rebecca Addison was eighth and Jillian Smith was 12th in 2012. The Wolverines have never won an NCAA Indoor title in this event, with Smith coming closest in a runner-up finish in 2011. Notably, Katie Erdman went on to a trio of top-five finishes after winning Big Ten Indoor 600-meter titles like Rynda in 2004, 2006 and 2007, and former school record-holder Gall posted a pair of top-six finishes in 2008 and 2009.
Players Mentioned
