Florida head coach Mike Holloway said that his team would focus on
their own performances at the Texas A&M Challenge and it
resulted in a day of personal-bests and qualifying marks.
This weekend, the Gators won five combined events, recorded 30
top-five finishes and had two athletes qualify for the NCAA
National Indoor Championships.
One of those qualifiers was Gray Horn, who set the school record
for the most first-day points in the heptathlon (3,242 points) and
ended up winning the event with 5,747 points — the second-best mark
in UF history.
“I know now where my strong areas are and I know the areas where I
need a little work,” Horn said. “Thankfully, the pros were higher
than the cons this weekend and we were able to put up a good score
and we’re going to nationals.”
Joining Horn at nationals will be Will Claye, who won the triple
jump handily (16.86m/55-3.75) over second-place finisher and fellow
Gator, Omar Craddock (15.82m/51-11).
Craddock already qualified for the national meet at the Nittany
Lion Challenge earlier this month.
“We’re not about setting world records or anything like that,”
Holloway said. “What we’re worried about doing is getting better
each week.”
In addition to Horn and Claye, Kemal Mesic and Dumisane Hlaselo
were the other two winners for the men’s team.
Mesic took top honors in the shot put with a throw
(18.88m/61-11.5), surpassing the second-best mark (17.08m/56-0.5)
by a significant margin. Hlaselo won the one-mile run in 4:05.95,
edging out his nearest opponent by 4.27 seconds.
On the women’s side, the Gators benefitted from impressive showings
from multiple underclassmen.
The lone winner for the women’s team was freshman Ebony Eutsey, who
won the 400-meter dash with a time of 54.59 seconds.
Eutsey’s winning time was the best of her collegiate career and she
was one of three female freshmen who recorded top-five finishes
this weekend (Stephanie Strasser and Lorraine Graham).
“We’re close to where we want to be,” Holloway said. “We’ve got a
couple of things we need to work on a little bit.
“The great thing about is that we’re really talented, we’re
focused, and as long as we stay focused, we’re going to be
okay.”
