Bruins hope to defend championship in Fresno

Friday, April 24, 1998

Bruins hope to defend championship in Fresno

Members gear up for weekend meet, while others get training
time

By Donald Morrison

Daily Bruin Contributor

Most of the men’s track and field athletes will take Saturday
and Sunday off. However, that doesn’t mean that No. 12 UCLA won’t
be a force at the Cal-Nevada Championships in Fresno.

The Bruins will send a plethora of field athletes as well as a
few track athletes to try to win another Cal-Nevada
Championship.

Last year, the Bruins won the meet in Northridge with 171
points. Fresno State finished second with 93.

This year, UCLA head coach Bob Larsen feels that the Bulldogs
have the edge.

"I would think (Fresno St.) would probably win it this year,"
Larsen said. "Being at home and having all their guys should
help."

Helping the Bruins this weekend will be Travis Haynes and Wade
Tift in the shot put. Haynes is currently fifth in the Pac-10 with
a mark of 62 feet, 3 1/4 inches. Tift is seventh in the conference
at 61-10 1/4.

Luke Sullivan will compete in the discus and hammer throws.
Sullivan is fourth in the Pac-10 in the discus with a season’s best
throw of 193-7. Scott Slover, who leads the Pac-10 with a pole
vault of 18-6 1/2, will also compete.

Mel Moultry will compete in both the long and triple jumps. Akil
Davis and Brandon Thomas will run the 100-meter dash, and Ibrahim
Hasan will run his second outdoor race of the season when he
competes in the 400 meters.

Michael Granville will run the 800 meters. Granville, after
sitting out meets earlier in the season due to a hamstring injury,
will run the 800 meters for the first time this season outdoors.
Jess Strutzel will run the 1,500 meters. Last week at Mt. SAC,
Strutzel ran 3 minutes, 56 seconds and is looking to improve on
that time this week.

Brian Fell and Gerimi Burleigh will compete in the hurdle races.
Fell won the 400-meter hurdle race at last year’s meet and will try
to defend his title this year. Burleigh will run the 110-meter high
hurdles. Distance runners Matt Olin, Dan Brecht and Kevin Bowes
will run the 3,000 meter steeplechase while Devin Elizondo will try
to improve his 5,000 meters mark this weekend.

Sitting out the meet and resting will be Pac-10 athlete of the
week Mebrahtom Keflezighi. His mark of 13:30.22 in the 5,000 meters
leads the nation.

Mark Hauser, who earned an automatic qualifying mark for the
NCAA Championships in the 5,000 meters, will also sit out.

Sprinters Jim McElroy, Damian Allen, Bryan Harrison, Randy
Brookes and Jacob Glickman will take time out to rest and get ready
for the dual meet next week against USC and Brigham Young
University.

"(Resting this week) is not just for the USC meet, but for the
season," Larsen said.

"We’ve been racing quite a bit so we need some training time.
You can’t race every week and not take some time off. The Pac-10
Championships are not that far away, so (the team) needs a training
base."