Baylor T&F Qualifies Seven Entries to NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championship

[Pirtle, Colin]

BAYLOR ATHLETICS COMMUNICATIONS – Feb. 27, 2024

Baylor T&F Qualifies Seven Entries to NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championship
Bears take seven athletes to Boston for first championship at New Balance
For more information contact: Colin Pirtle; 940-564-0351, colin_pirtle1 at baylor.edu<mailto:colin_pirtle1 at baylor.edu>


WACO, Texas – Baylor track and field will send seven entries to the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships next Friday and Saturday at the TRACK at new balance in Boston, Mass., a new facility built in 2022 that will host its first collegiate championship meet.



Earning the most qualifications in the Ford era and tying the third-most in the last 10 years, Alexis Brown, Laurenz Colbert, Nathaniel Ezekiel, Demar Francis, Molly Haywood, Alencia Lentz and Demario Prince all qualified for the final meet of the collegiate indoor season.



The Big 12 women’s long jump silver medalist, Brown is ranked as the No. 4 jumper in the nation behind her personal-best and program-record mark of 21-6 ¼. She is still the only Bear to jump over 21 feet indoors and scored a total of 13 points for the Bears across the long jump and 60-meter dash.



Colbert qualifies for his first indoor championship meet in the 200 meters, putting up a season-best 20.87 that was calculated to 20.63 with the altitude in Lubbock that ranks him at 12th in the nation. The junior narrowly missed qualifying in the 60 meters by three-hundredths of a second.



Ezekiel is making his third-straight trek to indoor nationals for the second-straight year in the 400 meters. The junior Nigerian is already a five-time All-American and took sixth place in the quarter mile final that featured three Bears in the 2023 NCAA meet before finishing fifth as part of the 4x400-meter relay. He enters the 2024 edition of the indoor championships as the ninth seed with a personal-best mark of 45.54 seconds.



In his second year in Waco after transferring from South Dakota, Francis is back in his second-straight 200-meter national semifinal. The senior lowered his own Jamaican national indoor record at the Big 12 Championship with a new personal-best mark of 20.42 seconds that put him ninth in the NCAA this season.



Haywood, one of three freshmen lacing up for the Bears at nationals, makes it in with the 11th-ranked height in the country of 14-5 ¼. Clearing that bar at the Corky Classic, Haywood stands as the fourth-best indoor vaulter in program history after one season.



Baylor’s lone Big 12 event champion from last weekend’s championship meet, Lentz is the second-highest ranked freshman in the country in the women’s pole vault at No. 4. Her 14-9 not only won the conference title but also set the meet record and tied the program record set in College Station during the 2020 season by Tuesdi Tidwell. She joined Tidwell and Annie Rhodes as the third Bear to win the indoor conference title.



Prince, the third and final freshman headed to Boston, qualifies to the meet in the 60-meter hurdles as the only freshman in the field of 16. The Jamaican set the program record with two identical races in the preliminary and final conference championship rounds, at 7.62 seconds and is ranked 11th in the country after the altitude conversion that pushed his mark to 7.64.



Action kicks off from the TRACK at new balance with weight throw on March 7 and wraps up on Sunday night, March 9<https://www.ncaa.com/_flysystem/public-s3/images/2024/02/27/2024%20Division%20I%20Indoor%20-%20Boston%20-%20New%20Balance_FINAL%20schedule_REVISED_2_26_24.pdf>. The starting gun for Baylor’s first event, the men’s 400 meters, fires off at 3:30 p.m. CT on Friday, March 8. The entire meet can be streamed on ESPN+.



For the latest news on the Baylor track and field team all year long, follow its official Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts: @BaylorTrack.



- BaylorBears.com –

_________________________________________
Colin Pirtle | Associate Director of Athletics Communications (T&F/XC, MTEN, FB)
Department of Athletics | Baylor University
C: 940-564-0351

[signature_2230589939]<http://baylorbears.com/>

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