Indoor Track Championships: Ducks Pursue a ‘Natty?

After the Men and Women of Oregon both won their initial Big 10 Indoor Conference meet, the teams move onward to Virginia Beach for the Indoor National Championships this weekend on March 14-15. ESPN+ has the most thorough coverage, while ESPN and ESPNU are also covering the meet, mostly with on replay. Mr. FishDuck was keenly interested in whether the Ducks had a shot at a ‘Natty, and thus took a break from his betting research at mightytips.com to look at Oregon’s opportunities with me.

While the men provided a ton of excitement by moving from the 6th seed to the title in last weekend’s Big 10 meet, it’s the women who have the best chance to bring home a National Championship.

Let’s give the men a huge hand for their unlikely conference championship. The battle was supposed to be between USC and UW for the title, but the Ducks blew up the form chart, scoring 51 points more than their projected 56. That’s simply crazy!

The men’s title hopes appeared dead after top heptathlete Cody Kessler no-heighted in the heptathlon pole vault, thus costing the team 8-10 points, and the Penn State winner of the 400M was disqualified, gifting USC 4 huge points; however, the middle distance men stepped up in the 600 and 800 meters scoring an almost unimaginable 32 points more than projected. The meet came down to the final two events.

The Ducks had little hope of scoring in the 4x400M relay while USC was favored. This meant the Ducks needed 13 points in the 3000M to clinch; USC had no entries in the race. While they out-performed the form chart, alas, the Ducks only scored 11. All USC needed was a second place in the final event to take the title. USC won the race. But wait! The official scoring wasn’t updated to reflect the Trojan’s win. Why? USC was disqualified with a rule violation. Ducks win!

Hurdler Aaliyah McCormick could score at nationals. (Screenshot from GoDucks.com Video)

On the national stage, the men project to score but three points. Despite coming through big at conference, the men have a young team and only two individuals in the 800m, a miler and a Distance Medley Relay (DMR) team. A podium spot isn’t possible, but I think the Ducks will outperform the form chart.

Possible scorers are Koitatoi Kidali and Matt Erickson in the 800 and I expect the DMR team will load up with fresh individuals who have nothing to do but run the DMR, while other DMR teams will have runners entered in more than one event. Simeon Birnbaum, fighting injury, will attempt to compete in the mile, and he’s the only projected Duck scorer.

Meanwhile, according to TFRRRS, the women are projected to finish 5th, but ace prognosticator Jack Pfeiffer picks the Ducks to win. Pfeiffer has spent years writing for Track and Field News and his projections tend to be most realistic. US Track and Field Coaches Association has the Ducks at No. 2. The Ducks biggest threat will be Arkansas, followed by BYU, Georgia and Texas Tech.

Lady Ducks to watch are Jadyn Mays in the 60M and 200M, Olympian Jaida Ross in the SP, collegiate record holder Silan Ayyildiz in the mile and the 3000M, Big 10 champ Aaliyah McCormick in the hurdles, and Wilma Nielsen who won the Big 10 mile and the women’s Distance Medley Relay team which set the collegiate record a few weeks ago, while also winning the Big 10 meet.

Additional entrants are Mia Barnett in the mile and Ryann Porter in the Triple Jump, neither of whom project to score. Sometimes it’s those non scoring threats that turn things upside down as well as the scoring threats who score a few more than projected.

Head Track Coach Jerry Schumacher. (Screenshot from GoDucks.com Video)

Here’s where I think the Ducks can win it: Mays has potential to score more than the projected 8 points total in the 60M dash and 200M dash. Olympian Jaida Ross is only projected 5th in the shot put, but I believe she’s been training to peak at NCAAs, thus her marks this season have been sub par. She’ll be ready to win it all. Wilma Nielsen has had a strong indoor season, yet is projected to score only 3 points in the mile, none in the 800M.

She’ll have a heavy workload running heats in both races on Friday and finals on Saturday, but she’s been running a lot of races and I think her conditioning will strengthen her chances to score more. Finally, Silan Ayylidiz is projected to win the mile, but get shut out in the 3,000. That simply won’t happen. Like Neilsen, she’s been running a lot of back to back races this year and should be able to handle the workload and possibly win the double as did Jordan Hasay in 2001. That’s 10 extra points, and enough to move the Ducks to No.1!

Finally, huge props to the coaching squad. As many remember, Coach Jerry Schumacher inherited a broken program just two years ago. Schumacher was smart enough to keep ace sprint coach Curtis Taylor in the fold, while adding Brian Blutreich two-time National Assistant Coach of the year to coach the throws and Shalane Flanagan, the first US woman to ever medal in the 10,000 meters came aboard as a distance and middle distance coach. Any questions about their abilities to get their athletes ready for big meets was answered at the B1G Championships.

The young athletes and the excellent coaching staff seem poised to bring Oregon Track and Field back into the National spotlight, while recruits line up to get selected to compete with winning teams at the best facility in the world.

Bruce Nelson
Eugene, Oregon
Top Screenshot from GoDucks.com Video

Bruce Nelson

Bruce is a reformed USC grad, class of 1972. Bruce competed as a middle distance and cross country runner in college and also coached track and field briefly.  He is now competing in Masters races, and is undefeated in his age category in the 5K over the last two seasons.

Bruce is rather obsessed with track and field and travels both countrywide and worldwide to attend meets.  Bruce is a proud resident of Tracktown USA, a status that makes his track fan friends around the world green with envy.