NCAA West: Three Hornets Advance to the Finals
Lea Wallace is the first Hornet woman to advance to NCAA finals in two events. Photo from the Big Sky Conference Champs
This weekend, three Hornets earned a trip to the NCAA Finals at Drake University by advancing out of the NCAA West Preliminaries in Eugene.
Senior Ronald Brookins will be making his second appearance at the NCAA finals in the 110 meter hurdles after finishing 2nd in his quarterfinal heat, running the event’s 5th fastest time of 13.47.
Teammate and fellow senior Lea Wallace advanced to the finals in the 800 on Friday, and again in the 1500 meters on Saturday. Friday, Wallace won her 800 heat and posted the fourth fastest time of 2:03.69. Then on Saturday, she took 2nd in her heat in the 1500 to automatically advance to the final, and posted the 7th fastest time of 4:20.38.
This will be Wallace’s second trip to the NCAA finals and she is the first Hornet woman to go to the NCAA finals in two events.
In the men’s 800 meters, sophomore Nathaniel Litwiller finished fourth in his quarterfinal heat, and didn’t auto-qualify but his 8th fastest time of 1:48.35 was fast enough to get him to Drake for the finals. (In the quarterfinals, the top three from each heat advance automatically, and then the next three fastest times also advance to the finals.) His time is also a new school record for the event.