USATF Juniors Recap: First-Year Collegians to Watch Out For

Throughout the USATF Outdoor Championships this past weekend in Eugene, Oregon, a number of collegiate standouts announced their arrival as contenders at the international level.

In total, 17 collegians from the 2015 season punched their tickets to Beijing to compete on Team USA in 19 individual events at the IAAF World Championships (August 22-30).

While they were blossoming into stars on the national level in the senior championships, a number of young collegians at the USATF Outdoor Junior Championships likewise announced (or re-emphasized) that they’re the NCAA level’s next wave of standouts.

FULL USATF Junior Championships Results

Here are a few teenage standouts who just finished their first collegiate seasons to keep an eye on in the 2016 track & field season and beyond.

Men’s Shot Put
John Maurins, Wake Forest

How significant was Maurins’ winning mark of 71-10¼ (21.90m) in the men’s shot put (6kg)? In short: very significant.

Not only was it the new U.S. Junior record in the six-kilogram shot put (7.260kg implements are used in open competition) by three-quarters of a meter, it also moved him to No. 5 on the performers list in the history of the world.

The previous best-ever throw by an American had been 69-5¼ (21.16m) by UCLA’s Braheme Days just a year ago.

At the NCAA level this year, Maurins just narrowly missed qualifying for the NCAA Outdoor Championships with an East Prelims mark of 60-6½ (18.45m) that placed him 14th. His season’s best had been a 61-5½ (18.73m) effort to finish runner-up at the ACC Championships.

Women’s 800 Meters
Raevyn Rogers, Oregon

Rogers certainly falls into the category of re-emphasizing that she’s the future of her event at not only the collegiate level, but likely beyond. She had her coming-out party on her home track at the NCAA Championships two weeks ago with a 1:59.71 to win the NCAA title – becoming just the fourth collegian to break the two-minute barrier during the NCAA season and the first frosh to do it.

By comparison, her USATF Junior title came much easier. The Duck controlled the final from start to finish, injecting the winning surge on the final straightaway to win by nearly two seconds in 2:06.64.

After a lackluster indoor campaign in 2015, she’ll return to the collegiate ranks in 2016 with an eye on getting the indoor/outdoor NCAA title sweep last accomplished by former Duck Laura Roesler in 2014. That campaign earned her the Bowerman Trophy, college track & field’s highest individual honor. Is there a 35-pound gold trophy in Rogers’ future?

Only time will tell.

Men’s 1500 Meters
Blake Haney, Oregon

A former prep prodigy, Haney fell under the radar during his first year at Oregon after quiet cross country and indoor track seasons, and even a mostly-silent outdoor campaign.

At the NCAA Championships, however, the radar finally picked him up. And for his competitors in the 1500-meter final, the warning came far too late. The Duck frosh surged to a third-place finish in what came down to a furious kick for the finish on the homestretch, holding off such stalwarts as Peter Callahan, Jordy Williamsz and Cristian Soratos.

He displayed those wheels again at USATF Juniors this weekend, taking down prep stars Andrew Hunter and Grant Fisher in another tactical affair on that same homestretch to win the national junior title in 3:58.16.

With two strong tactical performances in championship races plus a 3:41 under his belt from the regular season, Haney now has all the tools to contend for many NCAA titles to come.

Women’s Shot Put
Raven Saunders, Southern Illinois

Will 2016 be the Year of the Raven/Raevyn? Another first-year phenom who cemented her status as the collegian to beat in her event was Raven Saunders of Southern Illinois, the indoor and outdoor NCAA champion this year in the shot put.

Not only was she the USATF Junior champion in the shot put by more than two feet with a winning toss of 55-9¾ (17.01m), but she was also the top collegian in the senior shot put. She finished eighth overall with a heave of 58-6¾ (17.85m).

She’ll be back to defend her NCAA titles in 2016. She’s already the No. 4 woman on the all-time collegiate indoor performers list, and she’ll look to make the top-10 outdoors.

Men’s Decathlon
Harrison Williams, Stanford

Only seven other teenagers in the history of the world have done what Harrison Williams did in the junior decathlon this past weekend. The Stanford frosh took the title with 8001 points, moving him to No. 8 on the all-time world junior performers list.

He joins Gunnar Nixon (8018pts) and Kevin Lazas (8016pts) as the only three Americans to top that 8000-point barrier.

Over the course of the two-day decathlon, Williams topped runner-up Travis Toliver by 561 points.

His USATF Junior title came just two weeks after finishing fourth at the NCAA Championships with 7806 points. He was also runner-up at the Pac-12 Championships with 7679 points.

Women’s 100-Meter Hurdles
Dior Hall, Southern Cal

Just two weekends ago at the NCAA Championships, Hall broke the World Junior Record in the 100-meter hurdles final with a 12.74 (+1.7m/s) that earned her third-place in one of the fastest races in NCAA Championships history. In fact, her 12.74 made her the fastest (wind-legal) third-place finisher in the meet’s history and would have been fast enough to win 22 of the 34 NCAA Championships finals ever held in this event.

That performance pairs nicely with her World Junior Record from this past winter in the indoor 60-meter hurdles, earned with an 8.01 performance in the prelims at the NCAA Indoor Championships.

Back to the present: Hall came through this weekend with a dominant win in the USATF Junior 100-meter hurdles final, crossing the line in 13.02w (+2.6m/s) for a victory of nearly a quarter-second over Kentucky’s Jacklyn Howell.

A sophomore hasn’t won an NCAA 100-meter hurdles title since Tiffany Ofili in 2007 (her first of three straight). Can Hall break that streak, of will Tiffany’s sister Cindy Ofili – this year’s NCAA runner-up – stand in her way? Stay tuned.

Men’s Pole Vault
Audie Wyatt, Texas A&M

Wyatt entered his debut season as an Aggie with a career-best of 17-0 (5.18m). With all but the Pan-American Junior Championships presumably left on his schedule of his frosh season, he’s cleared heights of more than a foot higher in two consecutive championship meets.

He claimed the USATF Junior title this past weekend with a first-attempt clearance of 18-½ (5.50m) for a five-centimeter win. His mark was just four centimeters shy of the USATF Junior Championships record, a height he bypassed in trying to clear 18-4¾ (5.61m). He was unsuccessful on all three attempts.

That effort came just over two weeks after clearing the exact same height – again on a first attempt – to finish fourth at the NCAA Championships.

Also of note from that NCAA meet was Adrian Valles of Cincinnati, another frosh who cleared an identical 5.50m height, albeit on his second attempt.

Is it unreasonable to expect another 32-centimeter improvement next year? Maybe not.

The winner of this year’s USATF Outdoor pole vault title was Sam Kendricks, a former two-time NCAA outdoor champion at Ole Miss.

He came to Ole Miss with a career-best of 17-0 (5.18m). At the end of his freshman season, do you know what his collegiate career-best was?

Yup, it was 18-½ (5.50m).

Care to guess what he bumped it up to during his sophomore campaign?

All the way up to 19-¾ (5.81m) for a win at the Texas Relays. That’s a 31-centimeter improvement.

Women’s 400 Meters
Kendall Ellis, Southern Cal

A testament to the superb recruiting done by head coach Caryl Smith Gilbert, Ellis is the second Woman of Troy to appear on this list. Her inclusion comes on the heels of her USATF Junior title at 400 meters, which she won by eight-tenths of a second with a career-best 52.32 performance.

USATF Junior champs in this event have had a good run of luck as of late. Those names include the Texas trio of reigning World Junior champ Kendall Baisden, collegiate record-holder/two-time NCAA champion Courtney Okolo and two-time NCAA champion Ashley Spencer; as well as former NCAA indoor champion Diamond Dixon of Kansas and Bowerman Trophy winner Jessica Beard of Texas A&M.

And that’s just from the past ten years. Go back farther and you get names like Natash Hastings and Sanya Richards (Ross).

Admittedly, Ellis has some work to do before getting to that point. She was 24th at the recent NCAA Championships and didn’t qualify to NCAA indoors, but she does have experience on two 4×400 relay teams that finished runner-up outdoors and third indoors.

Men’s High Jump
Randall Cunningham, Southern Cal

The ascension of Cunningham to the heights of the top collegiate high jumpers has long been on the horizon. The son of former NFL quarterback Randall Cunningham has been clearing two meters in the high jump since 2011, and entered his frosh season at Southern California with a career-best of 7-3¼ (2.21m).

He took some time to get rolling in 2015, but he’s jumped as high as 7-4¼ (2.24m) this outdoor season and just this past weekend took the USATF Junior title in dramatic fashion with a third-attempt clearance at 7-2½ (2.20m). He then raised the bar for three attempts at the USATF Junior Championships record of 7-5¼ (2.27m), but ultimately came up short.

Two weeks prior, he earned his first collegiate All-America honor with an eighth-place finish at NCAAs at 7-1 (2.16m). Four of the men who finished ahead of him are out of eligibility, leaving plenty of room for him to step up in 2015 as he further develops.