Georgia Track and Field Places Fifth and Fifteenth in NCAA Finals
Georgia track and field claims a championship in both the womens and mens NCAA Championship meet.
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Georgia’s Keturah Orji became the first freshman to win the NCAA women’s triple jump title. The Mount Olive, N.J native beat her own school and American Junior records and is now the fourth all-time collegiate performer with the fifth all-time collegiate performance. Orji is the first Lady Bulldog to win a national triple jump championship indoors or outdoors.
After Orji’s second try of 46 feet, 5 ¼ inches effort earned the title, the Lady Bulldogs found themselves in third place at the NCAA Track and Field championships.
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But after Orji’s effort, the Georgia women watched helplessly as Texas A&M scored 16 points in the last three events and Arkansas scored 10 to bump the Lady Bulldogs from third to a fifth place finish. It is the Lady Dawgs second consecutive fifth place finish, third consecutive top 11 finish, fourth finish in the top five and ninth finish in the top 10.
“These last two, three or four years, the women have had some really nice success and now I am hoping they build on that,” said Bulldog head coach Wayne Norton to Georgiadogs.com. The women pulled it off with some key performances today, led by Keturah Orji in the triple jump. Keturah got the job done all year long and can build on this finish.”
Four of the top five women’s teams are from the Southeastern Conference. Oregon claimed the championship.
Junior Maicel Uibo captured the decathlon crown on Thursday for the Georgia Mens Track team. Only three times has a Georgia mens and womens competitor won NCAA outdoor individual titles in the same season.
With points earned on Thursday, Orji’s third place finish in the high jump and sophomore Tatiana Gusin fifth place finish in the high jump on Saturday gave the Georgia women fifth place with 41 points. Oregon (59), Kentucky (50), Texas A&M (47) and Arkansas (43) rounded out the top five finishers.
With a combined 13 points from Uibo in the decathlon and senior Nick Vena in the shot put, the Bulldog men finished 15th in the team race on Friday. It is the Georgia men’s third top-15 finish in the last seven years.
Meet host Oregon (85) won the NCAA men’s team title by 29 points over Florida (56) while Arkansas (53), LSU (45) and USC (40.50) rounded out the top five.
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Said coach Norton to Georgiadogs.com, “The men didn’t have a great meet, but we still finished 15th. For the seniors leaving, I hope they understand that they were a part of a great team that even when they didn’t have their best results at a meet, they had really good finishes.”
“The women pulled it off with some key performances today, led by Keturah Orji in the triple jump. Keturah got the job done all year long and can build on this finish. We also did a really nice job in the high jump with Leontia getting third and Tatiana getting fifth. These meets bring the best out in a lot of people and that happened today. I am pleased with the way these two competed.”
Junior Chanice Porter, who scored a point for the Lady Bulldogs with an eighth-place finish in the long jump, finished just outside of scoring in the high jump with a 10th-place finish. She cleared 5-11.25, which was a height that three scorers cleared who had fewer misses than Porter.
“We are not satisfied with both team finishes but we did enough this week to stay relevant, so to speak, in the track and field world.”
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