Track Receives Unprecedented Seven Selections to Regionals
5/17/2018 12:00:00 AM | Track and Field
Men's Declared Athletes | NCAA West Preliminaries Site
SPOKANE, Wash. -- Troy Fraley, Alex Heffelfinger, Scott Kopczynski, Kellen Manley, Brandon Pollard, Sammy Truax and Mason Villarma will represent Gonzaga at the 2018 NCAA Track and Field West Preliminaries on May 24-26. The complete list of declared athletes for the meet in Sacramento, Calif., were announced Thursday. This marks the largest-ever contingent of Zags to qualify for the meet.
Athletes who rank among the Top-48 in their respective event earn berths into the NCAA West Preliminary Rounds. The best 24 relay times also advance to NCAA prelims. Athletes with the top 12 times or marks and the best 12 relay teams at both the East and West Preliminary Rounds sites will qualify for the NCAA Championships in Eugene, Ore., June 6-9.
After the previous record amount of Bulldogs competing in the West Preliminary was set with six in 2015, three GU runners have competed at the last two prelims. Last year, Fraley ran the fastest time in the men's 3,000-meter steeplechase quarterfinal in Austin, Texas, before becoming the program's first-ever All-American with a seventh-place finish at the national championships in Eugene.
On May 24, Pollard, Villarma and Kopczynski run in the men's 1,500 meters at 5:30 p.m. There will be four heats of 12 runners in the first round in Sacramento. The top five finishers from each heat and the next four fastest times move on to the second round on May 25. The second round is two heats of 12 runners, the top five finishers from each heat, along with the next two fastest times advance to the national semifinals in Eugene.
Pollard is seeded 27th with a time of 3:44.63. He qualified with that time at the Portland Twilight on May 12. That time ranks second on the GU all-time list. Villarma ran his qualifying time of 3:45.91, which is fourth in program history, at the Oregon Twilight on May 4. The junior is seeded 41st in the event. Kopczynski enters 43rd with a seed time of 3:46.01. The sophomore ran the fifth-fastest time in Gonzaga history at the Portland Twilight.
Fraley, Heffelfinger, Manley and Truax are in the 3,000-meter steeplechase on May 25 at 8:20 p.m. The quarterfinals feature three heats of 16 runners. The top-three finishers from each heat, plus the next three fastest times to qualify for the semifinals in Eugene.
Manley enters the quarterfinals seeded 17th. He ran the second-fastest time on the GU all-time list, 8:51.26, at the Stanford Invitational on March 30. Manley returns to the NCAA West Preliminary Round for the second time. In 2016 as a sophomore, he placed 12th in his heat, and 31st overall, with a time of 9:13.70 in Lawrence, Kan.
Fraley makes his third appearance in the preliminaries. Prior to his historic run last season, he crossed the line at 9:10.49 in the 2015 West Preliminary in Austin, Texas. He placed 29th in the event, and 10th in the second heat. The then-sophomore entered the race as the 34th seed in the region and 12th in his heat. Now as a senior, he enters the regionals seeded 28th.
Truax is seeded 36th with a time of 8:55.95, while Heffelfinger is 43rd at 8:56.97. They rank third and fourth in program history and are making their first appearances at the West Prelims. Traux ran his qualifier at Stanford, while Heffelfinger ran his personal record at the San Francisco State Distance Carnival.
Live video provided by FloTrack, along with live results, from the NCAA West Preliminary Round will be available on GoZags.com.
