First-Day Results
RALEIGH, N.C. (May 24) – Shannon Kalawan (Jr./Westmoreland, Jamaica) of Saint Augustine's University gets a chance to defend her women's 400 dash and 400 hurdles national titles after qualifying for the finals in both events Friday, May 23, on the first day of the NCAA Division II Outdoor Track & Field Championships in Kingsville, Texas.
In Friday's preliminaries, Kalawan ran the women's fastest 400 time (54.24) and the second-fastest women's 400 hurdles time (59.18) to reach Saturday's finals in both events. She also led off the Lady Falcons' 4x100 relay team that qualified for Saturday's finals.
Kalawan won the third heat in both the 400 dash and 400 hurdles prelims to automatically qualify for the finals. The 4x100 relay team, which consists of Danielle Scantlebury (Fr./St. George, Barbados), Tashoy Blake (Jr./Clarendon, Jamaica), Amanda Crawford (Jr./Brooklyn, NY) and Kalawan, finished second in Heat 2 (46.28) to automatically qualify for the finals on Saturday. The unit ran the fourth-fastest qualifying time on Friday.
In other first-day action, Brandon Parris (Sr./Sion Hill, St. Vincent) of SAU advanced to Saturday's finals in the men's 400 dash after posting the second-fastest men's qualifying time (46.68) on Friday. He placed second in the first heat to gain an automatic bid to the 400 finals.
Parris was part of the men's 4x100 relay team that ran the sixth-fastest qualifying time (40.82). The relay squad, which includes Nathan Fergusson (Fr./St. Thomas, Barbados), Damere Gilbert (Jr./Sharon Hill, PA) and Jalen Jones (Fr./Raeford, NC), finished third in the second heat.
In the men's 400 hurdles prelims, Alazae Hester-Taylor (Jr./Homewood, AL) placed second in the third heat to automatically qualify for Saturday's finals. His time (53.48) was eighth fastest among qualifiers.
The three-day championship meet resumes Friday at Javelina Stadium on the Texas A&M-Kingsville University campus. Below is Friday's schedule for the SAU men and women.
Click HERE for live results and click HERE for live video of the meet. Both live results and live video are also on ncaa.com and saintaugfalcons.com.
Friday's Schedule
(Eastern Standard Time)
6:35 p.m. – Women's 200 Dash Preliminaries (Amanda Crawford)
6:50 p.m. – Men's 200 Dash Preliminaries (Brandon Parris)
7:20 p.m. – Men's 800 Run Preliminaries (Shaquille Dill)
7:40 p.m. – Women's 100 Hurdles Preliminaries (Danielle Scantlebury)
7:55 p.m. – Men's 110 Hurdles Preliminaries (Christian Smith)
8:50 p.m. – Women's 4x400 Relay Preliminaries (Jaria Hoyte, Amanda Crawford, Danielle Scantlebury, Shannon Kalawan)
9:10 p.m. – Men's 4x400 Relay Preliminaries (Nathan Fergusson, Jalen Jones, Darren Alfred, Brandon Parris)
