April 20, 2013
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By Jenna Marina
UCFAthletics.com
GAINESVILLE, Fla. (UCFAthletics.com) - As each week of the 2013 outdoor season passes, more and more members of the No. 13 UCF track and field team are penning their names in the school record book. On Saturday at the Tom Jones Memorial Classic, senior Erica Weiss and freshman Heather Classe became the latest Knights to make history.
Weiss broke a 7-year-old school record in the pole vault in the Knights' first event of the day. As the only remaining competitor after she clinched first place with a mark of 3.78m, she set her sights on breaking the former program-best 3.80m. She cleared 3.81m/12-06 on her first attempt, sprang up from the drenched mat and trotted back down the blue runway with her fist in the air and a smile on her face.
Technical issues that caused a 35-minute delay midway through the meet did not distract Classe (10:13.18) from breaking the 3,000-meter school record. In her first 3K of the outdoor season, Classe topped the 6-year-old mark for third place. Jocelin Adona (10:55.19) also hit a personal record en route to sixth place.
Thanks to the two outstanding performances Saturday, the Knights have rewritten school records for 17 different events during this year's indoor and outdoor seasons combined.
UCF swept the top times in three of the four heats of the 100 meters as Aurieyall Scott led the way with an overall-first place finish and season-best time of 11.27 (+0.9), ascending to No. 7 among the NCAA this season. Scott shined against a field that included 2011 USA champion Shalonda Solomon and 2008 World Championships bronze medalist and two-time Olympian Tahesia Harrigan-Scott.
Scott later blazed to a wind-aided 22.73 (+2.6) for her fastest season-opening 200-meter race. With the third-best time in the NCAA this year, she finished runner-up to seven-time Olympic medalist and nine-time World Championships medalist Veronica Campbell-Brown, who clocked the new all-conditions world-best time of 2013 (22.18).
Freshman Alexis Faulknor barely missed her personal record in the 100 meters, but she did notch a collegiate-best 11.54 (+1.8), which places her among the NCAA East Region's top 20, for the best time of heat two and fifth place. Senior Amanda Leland (11.91) edged her teammate Jen Clayton (11.93), who matched her personal best, in the third heat for 12th place.
Scott and Faulknor combined earlier in the day with Lutisha Bowen and Octavious Freeman to emerge as the 4x100 relay's top collegiate team after another NCAA top-10 time this year of 44.02. Freeman gained ground in the final stretch to edge Great Britain Track Club at the finish line for second place.
Sandy Jean closed in on the 400-hurdles school record but finished .18 short with a new personal record 57.77, placing second only to former Miami standout Dominique Darden. With her performance, she jumped up into the East Region's top five and the NCAA's top 15 this year.
Freshman Alyssa Hamel breached the conference's top-10 leaders of the steeplechase by shedding 40 seconds off her personal best to finish in 11:46.77.
Competing in the first 400-meter race of her collegiate career, junior Ne'Ausha Logan clocked a personal best 55.42 to finish as the second-best collegian and fifth overall while ranking among C-USA's top 10 so far this year.
Sophomore Cody Castillo clocked a season-best 4:39.31 and Amelia Williams topped her personal best for the second week in a row, 4:40.01, in the 1500 meters.
Junior Erica Winston earned a top-five finish in the 800 meters, pacing three Knights in the event with a time of 2:11.53 for another top-10 time in the conference this season.
Clayton led four Knights in the long jump as the second-best collegiate finisher with a fourth-place mark of 5.95m/19-06.25 (+0.3).
UCF travels next to the Arkansas Invitational on April 26-27. The trip marks the Knights' return to Fayetteville for the first time since Scott became the NCAA 60-meter champion and 200-meter runner-up and Freeman earned two bronze medals at the 2013 Indoor Championships.