#NCAATF Championships: Roesler Wins 800 Meter Title, Oregon Ducks Maintain Lead

Day number three of the NCAA Track and Field Championships started without a ton of fanfare as far as Oregon was concerened. There were not any Ducks in the Heptathalon which started the day with two events, the long jump, and the javelin. The main events for the Oregon Teams, both men and women involved running events on Day three of the competition, which started for them in pretty much non stop succession starting in the five o’clock hour.

On a relatively seasonable, or unseasonable day – depending on where your from, the Oregon Ducks teams looked to extend their respective team leads on the competition. It started with Jenna Prandini at 5:07pm PT in the 100 meter final. She did not disappoint in finishing third place by one one-thousandth of a second by leaning forward at the end. The next Oregon Ducks athlete to enter the blocks has had quite the career as an Oregon Duck. Senior Laura Roesler has carved her own special niche into the 800 meters. In her final race at Hayward Field as a member of the team, she did not disappoint coming from behind to win in 2:01.22 and picking up a National Title in the process. A fitting swan song.

The primetime block contined with several more Oregon Athletes seeing the outside track including Senior Mike Berry, running the 400 meter final had a lead but lost it and finished in second place to the Texas Longhorns Courtney Okolo. The final event for the night, the Men’s 5000 meters included a handful of Ducks including Edward Cheserek, who won the 10,000 meters on the opening night of competition, followed by Seniors Parker Stinson and Trevor Dunbar. Lawi Lalang from Arizona took the 5000 meters after being paced by Cheserek on the final lap. The Oregon Freshman took the lead briefly in front of 10,104 screaming fans on the final stretch before ultimately coming in second place.

If the Oregon Ducks Mens and Womens teams can maintain, Team National Titles are in the grasp for both on Saturday, the Oregon Men hold a wide margin over second place Florida 56 to 28, the Oregon Women have a slim two point lead entering the final day of competition on Saturday.

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