Track & field competes for Big Ten win in Madison, Wis.

Sunday
It all came down to the final event Sunday at the Big Ten Track & Field Championships in Madison, Wis.

Entering the men’s 4x400-meter relay, first-place Nebraska led Wisconsin by just 1.5 points and third-place Indiana by just 5.5 points, leaving the Hoosiers within striking distance for a Big Ten Outdoor Track & Field Championships win.

Unfortunately, the IU relay team placed third with a time of 3:05.69, just .42 seconds behind second-place Wisconsin. The Cornhuskers fell from the top spot and placed eighth.

With its finish and Nebraska’s late stumble, Wisconsin earned 8 points from the event and secured the Big Ten outdoor title, earning a total of 121 points. Indiana finished third with 115 points, just .5 points behind second-place Nebraska.
The Hoosier women finished with 40 points in total and in a last-place tie with Purdue.

Indiana men’s track finished third overall in the outdoor Big Ten Championships Sunday thanks to some strong individual and relay performances.

The Hoosier men recorded four individual championships for the weekend, capped off by titles in the 200-meter and 1,500-meter runs.

Senior Kind Butler won the 200-meter title in 20.51 seconds to earn his first outdoor Big Ten crown and the first Hoosier title in the event since Olympic Gold Medalist David Neville won in 2004. Butler also won the 200-meter indoor title this season, giving him three total Big Ten titles. 

Earlier in the day, Butler anchored the 4x100-meter relay team to IU’s second consecutive second place finish in the Big Ten outdoor finals event. Butler and teammates Nick Stoner, Tyler Sult and Chris Vaughn ran a 39.82, fifth fastest in IU history.

In the 1,500-meter, Junior Andy Bayer recorded a time of 3:41.21 to edge out Ohio State’s Cory Leslie and take the fourth Big Ten title of his career. It was his first title in the 1,500-meter and the second consecutive for Indiana after Ben Hubers won in 2011.

Redshirt-senior Danny Stockberger finished fourth with a time of 3:42.98, just .11 seconds out of third.

In the 400-meter, Vaughn, a redshirt-junior, took second with a time of 45.48 seconds. He clipped more than 1.5 seconds from his previous career-best and his time ranks sixth in Division I for the season.

Outside of the collegiate ranks, Vaughn’s time is tied for 26th in the world and 13th among Americans for the season. 

Even with the Hoosier men’s individual success, IU’s team championship chances came down to the wire. The weekend’s final event, the 4x400-meter relay, could make or break three teams’ pursuit of the Big Ten Outdoor Track & Field championship. 

Entering the relay, first-place Nebraska led Wisconsin by just 1.5 points and third-place Indiana by just 5.5 points, leaving the Hoosiers within striking distance for an outdoor championship.

Ultimately, the IU relay team placed third with a time of 3:05.69, just .42 seconds behind second-place Wisconsin. The Cornhuskers fell from placed eight in the race and fell from the top spot.

With its finish and Nebraska’s late stumble, Wisconsin earned 8 points from the event and secured the Big Ten outdoor title, earning a total of 121 points. Indiana finished third with 115 points, just .5 points behind second-place Nebraska.

Indiana’s time, however, was the fourth-fastest in IU history, and ranked fifth and 11th in the East region and nationally, respectively.

On the women’s side, Jordan Gray barely qualified for the women’s 800-meter final by placing in the ninth and final qualifying spot, but made the most of her opportunity. The senior took second in the final with a time of 2:06.89, ninth in IU history and just .22 seconds behind the lead.

Redshirt-junior Kelsey Duerkson took third in the women’s 1,500-meter with a time of 4:19.19, fourth in IU history. Junior Kelsie Ahbe cleared 4.16m in the pole vault, also placing third.

Yet more Hoosiers recorded top-ten performances in IU history. Redshirt-freshman Samantha Ginther placed fifth in the 5,000-meter by clocking a time of 16:35.95, eighth in IU history.

The 4x400 relay team of juniors Aireonna, Ruth Chrisopher and Gray, and freshman Antonia Franklin, ran the fourth-fastest time in school history, 3:38.76. They placed sixth.

For the weekend, the Hoosier women finished tied with Purdue in 10th place, recording 40 points.

Next up for Indiana is the NCAA East Preliminary round May 24-26, in Jacksonville, Fla.


Saturday
With one record-breaking jump, junior Derek Drouin punched his ticket to the London 2012 Olympics.

Drouin set the IU record, tied the all-time Big Ten record and matched the Olympic A standard with a 2.31-meter high jump in day two of the Big Ten Championships.
“The major goal, actually, was the Olympic standard,” Drouin said in a Big Ten press release. “I wasn’t too worried about the other records, but they came with it.”

The jump earned Drouin his fifth Big Ten high jump title, second in IU’s history to Dennis Adama.

Drouin’s performance paved the way for a one-two Hoosier finish in the high jump, as teammate and sophomore Darius King took second through a tiebreaker with a 2.17 meter jump.

In the men’s 3,000-meter steeplechase, Andrew Poore placed third, De’Sean Turner fourth, Adrien Dannemiller sixth and Andy Weatherford seventh.

Monique Riddick headlined on the women’s side, taking second in the women’s shot put with a throw of 16.25 meters. The senior has medaled at every Big Ten meet in her two years at IU.

In the women’s heptathlon, junior Courtney Woodward set a career-best point total, good for seventh place in the event and sixth all-time in IU history. Woodward added 40 centimeters to her javelin throw to help improve her career-best point total by 804 points.

Senior Anne-Marie Clarke took 10th in the heptathlon with 5,006 points, good for seventh highest in IU history.

At the end of day two, the Indiana men were in second with 44 points and the IU women in 10th with 10 points.

Friday
Indiana’s Zach Mayhew ran neck-and-neck with Wisconsin senior Elliot Krause for 9,700-meters of the men’s Big Ten Championships 10,000-meter run Friday, hosted by the Badgers at the McClimon Complex in Madison, Wis.

Mayhew, a junior, pulled away from Krause with 300 meters to go, securing a 10,000-meter Big Ten title and setting a Dan McClimon Memorial Track/Soccer Complex record with a time of 28:55.06. The time was nearly 30 seconds better than the previous complex record and more than four seconds better than second-place Krause.

“All year, I’ve been doing the same thing — get to that last lap and give it everything I got,” Mayhew said in a Big Ten press release of the final 300 meters. “I just went around with 300 to go, try to not look back and put everything I had into it.”
The Hoosier men ended the day in fifth place thanks to Mayhew’s 10 points.

In the men’s and women’s hammer throw, two Hoosiers missed the cut for the nine-thrower finals. Senior Daniel Galos placed 10th for the men with a throw of 59.27 meters. Despite setting a personal record with a throw of 55.55 meters, Monique Riddick only placed 10th on the women’s side.

More personal bests were set in the women’s heptathlon. Woodward notched personal bests in the 100-meter hurdles, shot put and 200-meter dash. She finished Friday in seventh place with 3,235 points.