LUBBOCK, Texas – BYU men's track and field wrapped up competition at the Big 12 Indoor Track and Field Championships Friday night in second place with 29 team points at the Sports Performance Center, highlighted by a 5000-meter win by Casey Clinger.
"Today was a team effort," said Clinger. "I’m super proud of the way we worked together to make the race fast, which played to our strengths and scored us lots of points. I’m stoked to get my first Big 12 title and I’m excited for the rest of championship season."
Clinger earned his first individual Big 12 Conference title with a 13:29.61 finishing time. The performance also established a new meet record. Clinger out-kicked Denis Kipngetich of Oklahoma State for the win. Brothers Creed Thompson and Davin Thompson finished third and fourth respectively.
“Casey [Clinger] and the rest of the 5,000-meter crew had themselves a night,” said Eyestone. “At the end of the day, we went first, third and fourth. Davin [Thompson] was patient and mowed through the field to get fourth. The times Casey and Creed [Thompson] should get them into nationals. We had fantastic performances across position groups as well. It was a picture perfect night.”
The men's 400m preliminary round saw Josh Taylor, Eli Hazlett and Trey Jackson each advanced to the final event on Saturday. Taylor finished fourth in the overall standings with a 46.08 finishing time. Hazlett recorded a new personal best of 46.22 to advance to No. 3 on the BYU all-time list.
"Survive and advance is everyone’s mantra when it comes to championship season," said Hazlett. "We had a group of 400-meter runners that were coming into the meet in a position to qualify for finals and it felt rewarding to get that squad to advance to the finals tomorrow. I’m excited to see what finals may bring."
Danny Bryant finished seventh overall in the men's weight throw with a new personal best mark of 19.71m/64-8. Bryant advanced to No. 8 on the all-time list.
"I was super pleased with Danny, who already in his first throw threw a personal record and then ended up having many personal records today. We decided to do the event with just the idea that maybe he could have a chance to get a point or two, so the fact that he got that goal and got two points for our team was huge. It was also an indoor goal for him to get on the top-10 board at BYU, which he did with today’s meet. For his last weight throw competition of his college career, it couldn’t have gone better."
Up Next
BYU returns to the Sports Performance Center for the final day of the event on Saturday. Watch live on ESPN+ or follow live updates here.