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College Coaches Name Indoor Athletes Of Year
March 16, 2006
USTFCCA names NCAA Division I Indoor Track and Field Athletes of the Year
Xavier Carter, Johanna Nilsson, Trey Hardee and Chelsea Johnson receive honors
Xavier Carter (LSU), Johanna Nilsson (Northern Arizona), Trey Hardee (Texas) and Chelsea Johnson (UCLA) are the NCAA Division I Indoor Track and Field Athletes of the Year, the USTFCCCA announced Thursday.
Carter and Nilsson are the Men’s and Women’s Indoor Track Athletes of the Year. Hardee and Johnson are the Men’s and Women’s Indoor Field Athletes of the Year.
The winners were determined in a vote by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association following last weekend’s NCAA Division I Indoor Championships in Fayetteville, Ark.
Carter won the 400-meter dash and anchored LSU to victory in the 4 x 400 relay at the NCAA indoor meet. He also finished a close second to Florida State’s Walter Dix in the 200. Carter’s time in the 400 (45.28 seconds) made him the third-fastest collegian in history and was faster than the winning time at the IAAF World Indoor Championships held the same weekend in Moscow.
The LSU sophomore moved to fifth on the all-time collegiate list with his 20.30 clocking in the 200. Completely an amazing two days of long sprinting, Carter ran a 45.9 anchor split on LSU’s 4 x 400 relay team, which ran 3:04.01 to narrowly miss the collegiate record.
Nilsson’s work in Fayetteville took a bit longer than Carter’s but was no less remarkable. The Northern Arizona senior won the mile on Saturday night by more than two seconds in 4:37.78, then returned to the track 90 minutes later to win the 3,000-meter run in a personal-best 9:06.61.
The 2005 NCAA champion in cross country, Nilsson also won the mile and 3,000 at 2006 Big Sky Conference Indoor Championships, running a 4:44.74 mile in the 6,894-foot altitude of Flagstaff, Ariz.
Hardee, a Texas senior, set a collegiate record in the heptathlon at the New Mexico Multi-Events Meet in Albuquerque, scoring 6,208 points. At the NCAA Indoor Championships, Hardee set personal bests in three of the first five events before having to withdraw due to an ankle injury.
On the first day of the NCAA meet – while also competing in the heptathlon – Hardee finished seventh in the open long jump (25 feet, 5π inches).
Hardee’s marks in the seven heptathlon events in his record-setting heptathlon were 6.73 in the 60-meter dash, 25 feet, 4∏ inches in the long jump, 46-11∏ in the shot put, 6-4≤ in the high jump, 7.87 in the 60-meter hurdles, 17-4≤ in the pole vault and 2:55.16 in the 1,000-meter run.
Johnson, a UCLA senior, finished her season with a bang. She cleared a collegiate-leading 14-5π to win the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation, then won the NCAA title with a school-record jump of 14-9, the third-highest mark in collegiate history. She took three unsuccessful tries at a collegiate-record 15-1.
Chelsea is the daughter of Jan Johnson, a 1970 NCAA champion while at Kansas and the 1972 Olympic bronze medalist in the pole vault. Chelsea has now won two NCAA indoor titles and one outdoor title while at UCLA.
To see the NCAA Division II and Division II indoor coaches and athletes of the year, visit www.ustfccca.org .
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