The West Virginia track and field team sent five athletes to Eugene, Ore., for NCAA Outdoor Championships last week. Four of those Mountaineers came home with all-American honors.
Four seniors – Karly Hamric, Marie-Louise Asselin, Clara Grandt and Keri Bland – earned the honor.
"It's a great feeling. It's been such an amazing year from cross country to indoors," said Bland, who also ran cross country for the Mountaineers in the fall. "Then, to finish the year with such a strong outdoors season was very special."
West Virginia finished 16th as a team at NCAA Championships. WVU head coach Sean Cleary's teams had a banner year. His track and field program brought a 10th-place finish in the Indoor Nationals, as well.
Those are the highest finishes in school history for the program.
Bland said Cleary prepared the team to compete well in more significant meets. She said the experience of running in those races helped the team focus on the high-pressured Championships.
"Coach does a good job preparing us for these top meets," Bland said. "Growing up in West Virginia, it was always about the big meets, whether the state meet or the regional meet. Preparing for big meets is something I have always been doing."
Asselin was the highest finisher for the Mountaineers. Her seventh career all-American honor came after a second-place finish to Iowa State's Lindsey Koll in the 5,000 meter (15:53.93).
Asselin is just the third Mountaineer to finish in second or better at NCAA Championships.
She has earned all-American honors in three-consecutive seasons, as she captured the honors in both cross country and the indoor track season, with a 31st-place finish and a second-place finish in the indoor 5,000-meter, respectively.
Hamric and Bland each advanced to the finals of the 1,500-meter race. Hamric (4:17.78) finished sixth – the highest placed 1,500-meter finisher in WVU history.
Bland (4:19.98) finished ninth. It is the second time in Bland's career that she was an all-American in three sports in a single school year.
Grandt wrapped up her storied career at WVU in fine fashion too, capturing her third all-American status of the school year. Grandt's honor came after her fourth-place finish in the 10,000-meter event (33:23.22).
Grandt said it was her teammate's mindset of competing at a high level each practice that helped the four seniors end their careers with all-American honors.
"Getting that honor was always a goal, and it was something that we could motivate each other during practice to reach that level," Grandt said. "In practice, we would be competitive with each other to make each other better. We wanted to push each other so that when the competition came, we were ready."
Cleary's two track teams were awarded a total of 11 all-American honors – seven indoors and now four outdoors.
Junior Katelyn Williams marked the first Mountaineer in WVU history to advance to the Championships in the high jump since 1990. She was unable to score in the finals.
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