May 6, 2007
PALO ALTO, Calif. - The first event of the Pac-10 Track & Field Championships came to a close Sunday afternoon at Stanford in Palo Alto, Calif., with two women and one man competing for Arizona State University in the heptathlon and decathlon, respectively. Jacquelyn Johnson finished third and Angela Piana was 11th in the heptathlon to earn six team points for the defending team champions while Joshua Kinnaman finished fourth overall in the decathlon to pick up five teams points.
Overall, the women stand second overall in the team race through one event with six points while Washington State leads with 18. Arizona (five), USC (four) and Oregon (three) round out the Top 5 in the women's race. For the men, Kinnaman's five points have the Sun Devils in fourth place while Arizona leads with 10. Oregon (eight), Washington State (six), ASU and Washington (four) round out the Top 5 in the team standings.
Johnson, the Pac-10 and NCAA heptathlon champion in both 2004 and 2006, scored 5,706 points to place third overall in the event while Piana, competing in her first collegiate heptathlon, tallied 4,425 points to finish 11th. Johnson entered the day in second place and remained there after the first two events. Johnson finished seventh in the long jump with a mark of 5.57m (18-03.25) before taking second in the javelin with a toss of 42.77m (140-04). Johnson then ran a time of 2:26.18 in the 800m run to place eighth in the race and third overall. Johnson's point total automatically qualified her for the NCAA Championships (June 6-9) in Sacramento, Calif.
Piana entered the day in 11th place and remained there throughout the final three events. Piana recorded a personal-best mark of 5.39m (17-08.25) in the long jump to finish 12th in the event before also taking 12th in the javelin with a toss of 26.12m (85-08). She closed the day with a personal-best time of 2:36.77 to place 12th in the 800m run.
In the decathlon, Kinnaman entered the day in fifth place and remained that way through the first two events of the day after running 15.53 in the 110m hurdles (ninth place) and throwing the discus 43.52m (142-09, second place). Kinnaman moved up to fourth place in the overall standings with a clearance of 4.05m (13-03.50) to place sixth in the pole vault before moving into third place following a toss of 48.00m (157-06) in the javelin to finish seventh in the event. In the final event of the day, the 1,500m run, Kinnaman ran 4:47.05 to finish fifth in the race and bring his point total to 7,086 points after his fifth-place showing in the run. His point total provisionally qualified him for the NCAA Championships.
The Sun Devils will send a full squad to Palo Alto next weekend to compete in the remaining events of the Pac-10 Championships. Action runs Saturday and Sunday.