Northern Arizona's Diego Estrada ran an altitude-converted sub-four minute mile, obliterating Olympian Lopez Lomong's four-year-old school record by nearly five seconds on Saturday, highlighting a day filled with top marks for the Northern Arizona University track and field teams. Estrada's NCAA auto-bid time of 3:55.46@ is currently the second-best Mile time in the country.
"Having Diego take down an Olympian's record is exciting, but the fact that it converts to a sub-four minute mile makes it even better," director of track and field and cross country Eric Heins said. "I was really glad that there were so many people in the stands today to witness that."
Estrada's record did not come without valuable help from a teammate, however. NAU senior John Yatsko was charged with pacing Estrada for the first several laps of the race, in an effort to earn him the splits needed to set the record, achieved by Lomong in 2007.
"It felt like a 5K race when John was pacing me, so I knew if I could hit 62 seconds on that first 400 meters the record was going down," said Estrada, a five-time All-American for the Lumberjacks. "That first quarter mile gave me the confidence to make it. Even though I won, I don't think it has sunk in yet."
Not to be overshadowed, NAU freshman high jumper Deante Kemper had a big day of his own. Kemper drew equally raucous applause from the crowd as he first cleared 7 foot high jump, then returned to clear 7-2.25. Both marks were personal bests for the Kemper. He narrowly missed both an NCAA auto-bid (7-4) and an NAU school record (7-3.25) on his three final jumps at 7-4.25.
The two performances were merely the beginning of a big day for the Lumberjacks, as they added nine more athletes (four men, five women) to the list of Big Sky qualifiers. NAU now has 28 athletes qualified in 21 different events for the conference championships.
By the end of the day the Lumberjacks had placed eight competitors atop the podium in their respective events, including Estrada and Kemper, and placed in the top-five 39 times.
Pascal Tang threw three feet farther than his previous conference-leading mark in the weight throw, tossing 62-11.5 for the win. Tang was followed in second and third by teammates Karl Gehrke (55-7.5) and Gus Margiotta (49-4.5), respectively.
The Lumberjacks swept the top-two spots in both the women's and men's 800-meter races, with European stars Caroline Hogardh (2:12.71@) and Agnes Laurent (2:14.53@) pacing the women, and Chris Ganem (1:53.88@) and Caleb Potts (1:55.22@) leading the men. The marks were the first Big Sky qualifiers of the season for Hogardh and Laurent, while Ganem notched his second after qualifying in the mile run two weeks ago.
Kortnee Burton blazed through the 3,000-meter race in a time of 10:00.36@ to take the victory, beating her nearest competitor by 11 seconds. Burton was the sole NAU qualifier in the 3K, but she was joined by freshman Sarah Baker in earning a Big Sky auto-bid for the 5,000 meters.
Senior Nicole Elliott earned a personal-best mark in the weight throw with a toss of 61-10.5, good enough for second place, to along with a fifth-place finish in the shot put. The weight throw performance placed Elliott among the top 30 marks in the nation as of Saturday.
Other notable female competitors for the Lumberjacks were freshman Alexis Clay, who won the women's open long jump with a jump of 17-4.5, freshman Darriel Banks, who earned second-place in the 60-meter dash (7.59@) and third in the 200-meter dash (25.04@) while lowering both her times from two weeks ago, and senior Rashida McKinnon, who earned second place in the 400-meter dash with a time of 58.07@ and anchored the NAU 'A' 4x400-meter relay squad to a second-place finish (3:52.11) by running 56.1 seconds in the final split.
Rounding out the meet highlights for the Lumberjack men was a title for the NAU 'A' men's 4x400-meter relay squad (Dennis Givens, Miles Di Sabella, Adel al Nasser, and Arnaud Froidmont) and second-place finishes for Caleb Hoover (3K; 8:18.37@), Tim Freriks (Mile; 4:12.42@), Gus Margiotta (shot put; 53-00), and Edgar Panford (triple jump; 49-7).
The Lumberjacks are in action next week for the NAU Open on Feb. 4 at the Walkup Skydome.
SWIMMING AND DIVING
NAU concluded regular-season competition Saturday as the swimmers claimed a 152-110 win over Grand Canyon and the divers closed competition at the Falcon Diving Invitational on the 3-meter board.
Junior Fi Connell and sophomores Rachel Palmer and Stirling Smith each won two individual swimming events and the divers were paced by senior Holly Frost's fifth-place finish. The Lumberjack swimmers won nine of 14 events with several season-best times in their meet hosted by Grand Canyon, which is ranked No. 3 in the nation in NCAA Division-II.
"I'm really pleased with how we finished up our dual meet season," NAU head coach Andy Johns said. "I think this sets us up really well for the conference meet. This is exactly what we were looking for in coming down here in terms of getting some good racing in and fine tuning some things."
NAU opened with a team season-best time of 1 minute, 46.49 seconds to win the 200 medley relay from its 'A' squad of Connell, Palmer, sophomore Jordan Burnes and junior Kelsey Loy. Connell earned her first win in the 100 backstroke in 58.58 seconds, and later took the 200 back in 2:04.49. Smith swept the breaststroke events, taking the 100 breast with a season-best time of 1:05.67 and the 200 breast in 2:21.33.
The team season leader in the butterfly and individual medley events, Palmer got her first individual win in the 200 fly in 2:04.31. She followed with a team season-best time of 4:27.06 to win the 400 IM. The Lumberjacks also received individual wins from sophomore Emma Lowther in the 200 freestyle in 1:53.31 and senior Chalene Dirks-Ryan in the 100 free in 53.00.
Two NAU divers advanced to the final in the 3-meter competition at the Falcon Diving Invitational. Frost was the top Lumberjack finisher, totaling 277.90 in the final to place fifth overall. Freshman Kali Lents, who was the top NAU finisher in the 1-meter and platform competitions on Friday, also advanced to the final with a score of 249.90 and scored 248.10 in the final to place seventh. Senior Cassie Anderson and freshman Katie Dallmann also dove in the prelims but did not qualify for the final.
The squad has three weeks to prepare for the WAC Swimming & Diving Championships, which will take place Feb. 22-25 in San Antonio, Texas.
WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
NAU scored a school-record 59 first half points to take a 35-point halftime lead en route to a 94-56 win over Sacramento State on Saturday night at the Rolle Activity Center. The Lumberjacks posted a 58-34 rebounding advantage and recorded a season-high 21 steals in their second Big Sky win, moving to 2-7 in conference play and 7-14 overall while the Hornets dropped to 8-14 overall and 3-6 in conference.
"Our focus has been to cut harder, wait for screens longer, and play better team basketball, and we did that (Saturday)," NAU head coach Laurie Kelly said. "We're a talented team if we are able to feed off everybody's strengths. The first half was great basketball; we ran a lot of good defense that led to offense.
"To me this was a team we had to beat," added Kelly. "We did what we needed to do and that confidence, energy and focus we've had in practice will hopefully build into this upcoming four-game road stretch. We know we're climbing up hill right now and it's essential that we don't give any games away."
Junior Tyler Stephens-Jenkins led three Lumberjacks in double figures with 18 points, 14 of which came in the first half, on 7 of 9 shooting and a trio of 3-pointers. Junior Amy Patton totaled 14 points and eight rebounds and sophomore Khyra Conerly finished with 10 points and equaled the team high with four assists. Sophomore Shay May had eight points and a team-high nine rebounds, and junior Caty Huntington had five of NAU's 21 steals, which equaled the fifth-best single game steals mark in program history.
"We just came out ready to play," Stephens-Jenkins said. "We felt like they stole the game from us up there (Sacramento State won 91-85 in double overtime), so we didn't want the same thing happening again."
NAU will play its last four conference road games over the next two weeks beginning at Eastern Washington at 7:05 p.m. Thursday.
MEN'S BASKETBALL
Sacramento State snapped a 14-game losing streak against Northern Arizona with a 77-43 win Saturday night at the Hornets Nest. Sacramento State won its first conference game of the season, while the Lumberjacks lost their eighth-straight Big Sky game.
NAU dropped to 5-16 on the season -- 1-8 in Big Sky play -- while the Hornets improved to 5-15, 1-8. Sacramento State snapped a nine-game losing streak overall and 11-game conference losing streak. The two teams split a pair of meetings this season.
The Hornets took control of the game early and extended the lead in the second half. Konner Veteto led the Hornets with 24 points off the bench, while Jackson Carbajal had a career-high 18 points.
Stallon Saldivar and Mike Dunn struggled from the field combining to go just 1-for-12 from the floor. Junior Gabe Rogers led the Lumberjacks with 13 points, making 4 of 9 shots. James Douglas had 11 points, while Gaellan Bewernick added nine points.
NAU was out-boarded by 13 and had 16 turnovers in the game. The Hornets out-scored the Lumberjacks 50-20 in the paint.
Douglas led the Lumberjacks with six points in the first half.
NAU returns home for three games next week at the Rolle Activity Center starting with Northern Colorado at 6:35 Monday night. The Lumberjacks also host Portland State and Eastern Washington next week.
MEN'S TENNIS
Despite junior Shaun Waters claiming a victory at No. 4 singles, the Lumberjacks dropped to 0-2 on the year, falling 6-1 to Vanguard Saturday afternoon on the UC Riverside campus.
"The score does us no justice," director of tennis Kim Bruno said. "We had our opportunities in every match one through six and in doubles. Everyone lost their matches by one break and the thing we have to take out of this is how are we going to play those big points better tomorrow. We just have to keep our heads up and move forward."
Waters' first singles victory as a Lumberjack after spending the last two seasons at Middle Tennessee State came against Robin Wagner, 6-4, 6-4.
Sophomore Dominic Bermudez and junior Robert Martin dropped their match at No. 2 doubles, but junior Patrick Schimmelbauer and senior Ben Lantz evened the doubles portion of play with their first victory of the season. The NAU duo, winners of eight doubles matches a year ago, easily defeated Vanguard's Wagner and Radek Rosiak, 8-2, leaving the doubles point up to the No. 1 match. But Waters and senior Robin Pezzutto dropped a close one to Lucas Pereira and Yahor Kryvaruchka, 8-6, clinching the doubles point for the Lions.
The Lions won five of the six singles matches. Lantz at No. 6, was a set away from winning his first singles contest of the season, but lost the final two sets following his opening set victory, 4-6, 6-0, 6-4 to Rosiak.
The Lumberjacks continue play in Riverside at 1 p.m. today when they take on host school, UC Riverside (0-2). NAU narrowly defeated the Highlanders last season in Glendale, 4-3.
Editor's Note: The NAU Sports Information Department contributed to this story.
