Texas A&M track and field traveled to Fayetteville, Arkansas to face arguably their toughest competition to date—the No. 3 men led the scoring on day one of the Razorback Invitational but finished second on Saturday with 105.5 points. The No. 20 women tallied 28.5 points to finish ninth out of 13 teams.
Arkansas won both the men’s and women’s title while scoring 122.2 and 127.5 points, respectively. After the Razorbacks, the men’s team results went Texas A&M (105.5), Oregon (87.7), LSU (65), Georgia (57), Florida (47), UCLA (41.5), Oklahoma (35.7), Iowa State (32.2), Iowa (24), Oklahoma State (20) and Florida State (14.2).
Oregon’s women’s team tallied 102 points to place second and were ahead of Georgia (76) Florida (70), Oklahoma State (57), LSU (50), Iowa State (44), Oklahoma (34), Texas A&M (28.5), Florida State (28), Iowa (16) and UCLA (15).
Friday was an action-packed day for the Aggies as they recorded 78.5 points. Freshman Jacob Wooten nearly surpassed the A&M school record for pole vault but won it clearing a height of 17-7 — Chase Wolfle and Audie Wyatt tied for second place jumping 17-1.
In two different heats of the 200m, Devin Jenkins ran his best and winning time of 20.77 seconds, beating Arkansas’ Keno Cotton who ran 20.78 seconds. Aliyah Brown ran the 200 in 23.42 to secure fifth overall as Florida’s Kyra Jefferson went 22.72, the best seen around the world this year.
In the distance, Austin Wells won the 5000m leading the entire way and set a personal indoor best of 14:19.88 as teammate Christian Farris also ran a personal best of 14:43.25 to take second. The Aggies placed third in the distance medley relay with a time of 9:35.62 behind Oregon (9:30.95) and Oklahoma State (9:35.35) after their 400m leg was tripped. For the women’s distance medley relay, the Aggies placed seventh with a time of 11:34.30.
Finishing in fourth in the long jump was Texas A&M’s Will Williams marking 25-0 ¾, Sam McSwain jumped 7-0 ¼ for two consecutive weeks to place second to Arkansas’ Ken LeGassey, and A&M’s Annie Kunz jumped 5-7 ¼ to place fifth in the high jump.
On the following day, Texas A&M had some impressive performances but was unable to hold their overall lead for the men’s team title. Fred Kerley posted 46.48 in the open 400m behind L.S.U.’s Michael Cherry, who ran 45.78 seconds. Shamier Little anchored the women’s 4×400 relay to run 3:35.86 and finish second to Oregon while L.S.U. outran the field in the 4×400 to record a world-leading time of 3:04.46 — A&M placed fourth in 3:10.77.
A&M’s Latario Collie placed third in the triple jump with a mark of 52-3 ¼ as Jennifer Madu lowered her 60m time in the finals to 7.30, garnering fourth. Devin Jenkins ran 6.80 in the 60m finals to place seventh and in the 3000m run, Cameron Villarreal ran to a seventh-place finish in 8:14.02 — Alex Riba raced in an earlier section of the 3000m, posting 8:23.38. Efrain Hernandez won his section but placed fifth in the 800m with a personal best of 1:50.36.
Next weekend, the Aggies will host the Texas A&M Charlie Thomas Invitational — a two-day meet starting Friday Feb 5th and finishing on Saturday the 6th.
