SACRAMENTO, Calif.—Spurred by two individual titles, as well as seven all-America citations, the BYU men's track and field team finished fourth at the NCAA national championships on Saturday. The BYU women finished in 10th place, the Cougars' best finish since a 10th-place showing in 2002.
For the first time since 1974, the Cougars claimed two individual titles. Rodrigo Mendes won the triple jump on Saturday to claim the Cougars' second individual title in as many days. Robison Pratt claimed the national championship in the pole vault on Friday.
Overall, the Cougars had 11 athletes win all-America citations in 12 different events, including seven all-Americans on the men's team and four all-Americans (in five events) on the women's team.
Arkansas won the men's competition with 60 points, followed by Florida (49) and LSU (36). The Cougars finished ahead of Pac-10 champion Oregon, as well as other perennial powerhouse programs like Texas, Texas A&M, UCLA, USC, UTEP, Georgia, Nebraska and South Carolina.
Mendes won the triple jump crown with a distance of 55-feet-11. Mendes beat USC's Allen Sims by just one centimeter.
"I'm just so happy," Mendes said. "I've been training for this for so long. I wanted to win this more than anything. I'm just so happy.
"We have such a great team. We have such great coaches and great teammates. Everyone has done an amazing job."
Bryan Lindsay turned in a 3:38.31 in the 1,500 meters to break Doug Padilla's 24-year-old record by six one-hundredths of a second.
"I've been training for this day," Lindsay said. "These are the things you dream about. I came to BYU because of the great runners, and to have the opportunity to challenge their records. I'm just very pleased."
Lindsay, who ran the first 1,000 meters in his traditional place at the back of the pack, moved into fifth place with 400 meters remaining. With 150 meters to go, Lindsay made his move and held on for a second-place finish.
"I had a feeling back in 1999 that Bryan would break my record," Padilla said. "That's what records are for."
Heidi Magill finished her freshman season picking up all-America honors in the 1,500m with a fifth-place finish. Magill, who won the event two weeks ago at the NCAA West Regionals, turned in a personal-best time of 4:15.57.
In her final race as a senior, Aneta Lemiesz picked up all-America honors, but it wasn't in a way she had planned. Coming down the home stretch in the 800m, Lemiesz was looking to move up when disaster struck. Nebraska freshman Egle Uljas stumbled and fell to the track. Unable to avoid her, Lemiesz also went down, ending her hopes of a top finish in the race.
Lemiesz was able to walk to the finish line to claim eighth place and all-America honors.
Niklas Arrhenius became the eighth BYU athlete to earn all-America honors with a seventh-place finish in the discus. Arrhenius, a sophomore from Orem, recorded a mark of 186-04.00 on his first attempt of the competion, and was unable to improve on that throw through the final round of competition.
After earning all-America honors in the long jump on Thursday, sophomore Amy Menlove came back to win all-America honors in the heptathlon on Saturday. It was only the second time Menlove has ever competed in the heptathlon. Competing in seven events over the past two days, Menlove recorded a lifetime-best 5,486 points to finish ninth overall in the competition.
"For only the second time competing in the heptathlon, she did a heck of a job," BYU women's coach Craig Poole said. "Some of these other girls have been competing since high school." This is only Amy's second time — ever. I'm very proud of her. She did a great job."
Earlier in the wee, Josh Rohatinsky earned all-American honors with a seventh-place finish in the 10,000m.