Cougars Turn In Three National Marks At UCLA Meet

LOS -- The BYU men's track team turned in three national qualifying marks in addition to five event wins, finishing second behind host UCLA at the UCLA Triangular Meet on Saturday.

The Bruins brought a full squad to the meet and scored 173 points to win the meet. The Cougars, who had part of their squad in Ogden, Utah competing at the Wildcat Invitational, scored 97 points to narrowly defeat Cal Northridge with 94.

"For the most part we had a very good meet and I was pleased with how the team performed," BYU women's head coach Mark Robison said. "Our three provisional marks is more than we have had at any other meet, so that is very good."

The No. 3 Bruin women's team proved too strong for a partial Cougar squad missing most of its distance squad, winning the meet with 169 points. CalNorthridge scored 117 to edge out BYU, who was third with 101 points.

"I see bright things in our future and we are still moving in the right direction," BYU women's head coach Craig Poole said. "We did quite well and had a lot of improvement but UCLA is a very good team."

Individually, All-American Jeff Hansen, the 2002 indoor national champion in the pole vault, cleared a provisional qualifying height of 17-05.50 (5.32) to win the pole vault title at UCLA.

He was joined by All-American Mao Tjiroze, who won the 800 in an NCAA provisional qualifying time of 1:48.52, and Greg Flint finished second in the 400-meter hurdles in a provisional qualifying time of 51.03 seconds.

In addition to the Hansen and Tjiroze wins, Dan Parkinson won the javelin with a throw of 180-02.00 (54.91), Matt Nielsen won the 400 in 46.77 seconds and David Pendergrass cleared a height of 6-10.25 (2.09) to win the high jump.

The Cougar women had three individual event wins, including Lindsey Johson, who won the javelin with a throw of 165-00.00 (50.30). Emily Mars won the 5,000 in 17:57.87 and Kendal Hathaway won the second heat of the 100-meter hurdles in 15.48 seconds.