( Photo by John Kelley )
[su_spacer size=”40″] On Wednesday, senior Nick Vena put the Bulldog men on the scoreboard with a sixth-place finish in the shot put. The Bulldogs are currently in fourth behind Oregon (40), Florida (16) and USC (15).
[su_spacer size=”40″] The Lady Bulldogs had five scorers on Thursday, including a record-breaking second-place finish by sophomore Kendell Williams in the heptathlon. Following the second of four days, the Georgia women are in third with 21 points while Oregon (31) and Arkansas (22) hold down the top two spots.
[su_spacer size=”40″] In addition to Williams , senior Quintunya Chapman took third in the heptathlon, junior Freya Jones was fifth in the javelin and freshman Keturah Orji and junior Chanice Porter went 7-8, respectively, in the long jump for the Lady Bulldogs.
[su_spacer size=”40″] “Day two was a lot better to us than day one was,” said Bulldog head coach Wayne Norton. “Today we bounced back with Uibo defending his title, which is a very tough thing to do. And not only did he defend it, but he got a personal best with a score that ranks near the top of the world list. That now means the men’s scoring is done, we have no more bullets to shoot. We have to live with what we have and hope no one else scores any points so we stay where we are.
[su_spacer size=”40″] “On the women’s side, I thought we finished the heptathlon nicely with Kendell and Quintunya (who finished third overall) scoring with personal bests so we were proud of their effort. The person who was fourth was the national leader coming in so we did a good job there. We thought we could finish higher than we did in the long jump, but the jumping was out of this world with some of the best jumps in the history of the NCAA. Our girls did well in the event so we have to be happy with that.
[su_spacer size=”40″] “We were also fifth in the javelin with a competition where the top two girls really threw well and set the precedent. Freya wasn’t at her best, but she did have her best meet of the year and I am pleased she scored. This meet has evolved into an elite, world-class meet so we have to accept where we are and be grateful. We will now look forward to trying and scoring some more points on the women’s side on Saturday. Our goal is still to win this championship.”
[su_spacer size=”40″] Uibo was 21 points behind Arizona’s Pau Tonnesen going into day two, but Uibo answered with a 130-point swing to become only the second competitor in NCAA history to win two in a row. A native of Polva, Estonia, Uibo set a school record and became the all-time No. 4 collegiate performer with the No. 4 all-time collegiate performance thanks to his 8,356 points, which is the second-best score at the NCAA Championships in history.
[su_spacer size=”40″] To lock down his first personal best of the meet, Uibo equaled his output from this year’s SEC Championships of 17 feet, ¾ inches to take third in the pole vault. This mark, which is No. 9 on Georgia’s all-time top-10 list, earned Uibo 972 points.
[su_spacer size=”40″] One event later, Uibo left his former personal best in the javelin far behind to overtake the overall lead. Uibo approached his previous career-long on the first throw (193-2) and then hit 204-2 for 772 points to finish second in the event.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Uibo started his day two with his fastest 110-meter hurdles since 2013. He took 11th in the event with a time of 14.99 for 851 points, marking the first time since his freshman season that he has broken 14 seconds.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Uibo went a foot and three inches farther than his discus performance at the 2014 NCAAs to win for 797 points in the discus. He improved 34 feet between his first and second attempts and then capped his second event of the day (seventh overall) with a mark of 152-4.
[su_spacer size=”40″] In the finale of the decathlon, Uibo ran a season-best time of 4:28.48 to take fifth and tally his final 755 points. He managed to clinch the title by finishing the race 13 seconds faster than Tonnesen.
[su_spacer size=”40″] During the heptathlon, Williams and Chapman registered day one personal-best scores and stood second and third through four events on Wednesday. A day later, Williams kept her second-place finish with a personal-best and school record score of 6,223 points, which is the 10th-best collegiate performance by the seventh-best collegiate performer in NCAA history.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Chapman, who was the previous school record holder at 6,146 from this year’s Bulldog Heptathlon, improved her personal record by one point to edge Mississippi State’s Erica Bougard by 97 points for third place. Bougard was the SEC champion and the national leader coming into Nationals.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Williams exited the long jump with the best mark in the multis version of the event of her Georgia career. Williams answered a 20-9.75 opening try with a second effort of 21-1.25, which is her best performance since going 21-2.50 in the open long jump at this year’s Georgia Invitational.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Following her career performance in the long jump, Williams wasted little time nailing down another personal best in the javelin. She reached 127-1, which is 14 feet longer than her last NCAAs, on her first attempt to score 643 points. Her former best of 125-2 came at the 2014 Bulldog Heptathlon.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Williams completed her fifth collegiate heptathlon with a time of 2:22.43 in the 800. This finish, which was a season best and six seconds faster than her 2014 NCAA race where she fell down, scored Williams her final 791 points.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Chapman came out of the gate with a career-long throw in the javelin to take third and score 738 points. Coming in with a 138-10 personal best, Chapman launched her first throw 143-3 and pushed her way into third place in front of Bougard by 92 points.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Like Williams, Chapman had her top effort on her second try in the long jump. She traveled 19-11 to score 871 to keep pace in the overall competition with a pair of events remaining at the point.
[su_spacer size=”40″] In the final event, Chapman was third in her heat and seventh overall with a 2:19.96 to score her final 824 points.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Jones, who won the 2013 NCAA javelin title as a true freshman and was sixth as a sophomore, launched her top effort on her third try and scored four points for Georgia with a fifth-place finish. Jones watched her best throw travel a season-best distance of 177-6, which was six inches from tying for fourth.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Following up on Norton’s comments, the first through eighth-place finishers in the women’s long jump were the top marks in history at an NCAA Championships. Orji soared 21-6.75 in the first round of the finals on her fourth attempt to take seventh. One spot behind her was Porter, who also earned expected First Team All-American honors by taking eighth (21-4).
[su_spacer size=”40″] Georgia’s finish in the long jump scored the women three more points as the top three finishers cruised past the 22-foot mark.
[su_spacer size=”40″] For the first time in history, the NCAA meet went to a staggered schedule featuring just events for the men on Wednesday and Friday and only women’s events on Thursday and Saturday. The two exceptions were the decathlon and heptathlon competitions, which started on Wednesday and were completed on Thursday.
[su_spacer size=”40″] The Bulldogs do not have any competitors on Friday. On Saturday, junior Leontia Kallenou, junior Chanice Porter and sophomore Tatiana Gusin compete in the women’s high jump at 4:30 p.m. ET. Kallenou is the defending NCAA champion in the event.
[su_spacer size=”40″] Orji will compete in her second event of the Championships, the triple jump, at 5 p.m. She is the NCAA leader and swept the SEC indoor and outdoor titles.