Michigan
NCAA Outdoor Championships
Sutherland Captures NCAA 400-Meter Hurdle Title
6/10/2023 11:59:00 PM | Women's Track & Field
Site: Austin, Texas (Mike A. Myers Stadium)
Event: NCAA Championships (Day 2 of 2)
U-M Result: 14th of 63 teams (17 points)
Next U-M Event: Season completed
• Complete Results (PDF) | Photo Gallery
AUSTIN, Texas –- Savannah Sutherland of the University of Michigan women's track and field team won the 400-meter hurdles title to highlight the final day of the NCAA Outdoor Championships on Saturday (June 10) at Mike A. Myers Stadium. Sutherland is the Wolverines' first women's NCAA champion since 2017.
U-M finished with 17 points to finish 14th in the team standings, with host Texas winning the team title.
Sutherland ran a lifetime best 54.45 seconds in claiming victory. She led wire-to-wire, going first over the initial hurdle and held off a contest from Kentucky's Massai Russell over the final hurdle. Sutherland entered the day an underdog, with Arkansas' Britton Wilson and Russell the favorites. The Michigan sophomore approached the race, and the focus on Wilson and Russell, as an opportunity, telling reporters, "I had nothing to lose, so I might as well give it all I've got". Her time was nearly a full-second improvement on her previous best (55.36). It also set a school record, Canadian U23 record, 2023 world top-10 mark and a world standard. Sutherland is the Wolverines' first women's NCAA Champion since 2017 (Jaimie Phelan, 1,500 meters). Sutherland earned first team All-America honors.
YOU'RE A CHAMPION SAVANNAH!! ??
— NCAA Track & Field (@NCAATrackField) June 11, 2023
?? ESPN2#NCAATF x @UMichTrack pic.twitter.com/6ld9wHQazc
That moment when ????#NCAATF x @UMichTrack pic.twitter.com/ITbDZXdC8Q
— NCAA Track & Field (@NCAATrackField) June 11, 2023
In the 800 meters, Aurora Rynda closed out her Michigan career earning first team All-America honors with a seventh-place finish, running a time of 2:03.15 -- scoring outdoors for the first time. She kicked off the race strong, running a split of 59.69 on the first lap -- the fourth-fastest split of the first 400 meters. Rynda ends her career with a combined seven All-America honors (indoor and outdoor).
In the 100-meter hurdles, Aasia Laurencin also scored NCAA points for the first time in her collegiate career, taking seventh in 12.82. With a wind speed of +3.8 m/s the race was not wind legal. The result marked the conclusion to an impressive season for Laurencin, who earned multiple program top-10 marks and improved on her career-best every meet for four consecutive meets at the end of the outdoor season. She ends the season with an impressive 12.80 best – a mark earned in Thursday's (June 8) semifinals.
Ziyah Holman ran another impressive 400-meter race Saturday, finishing sixth in the event final with a time of 51.04. Holman was up against an extremely talented 400-meter field, with three Arkansas Razorbacks spearheaded by indoor 400-meter champion Britton Wilson. Holman's time was her third best of the season and the third best mark in program history. Like her teammates, she also scored outdoors for the first time in her career, earning first team All-America status.
With their 17 points, the Wolverines earned the highest team finish since 2009 and also were two points shy of a top-10 finish. All four Wolverines scored and earned first team All-America status.
Michigan's 2022-23 season is now complete, one that also saw U-M win both the Big Ten indoor and outdoor titles in addition to its success in Austin.
Players Mentioned
