Logue secures 11th career conference championship, with Abdalla capturing his first for Longhorns; Lueking prevails in women’s pole vault, Usual and Usoro both three-peat for Texas Tech, with Blazevica producing pentathlon crown for Texas

By Landon Negri for DyeStat

AMES, Iowa – The marquee individual event Friday, the first day of the Big 12 Indoor Track and Field Championships, was an exhibition of contrasts.

Iowa State senior Cailie Logue won the first of her three events of the weekend by capturing her 11th career conference championship in her home arena. Texas redshirt freshman Yaseen Abdalla might have sparked a new era by winning his first conference title on the men’s side.

Such was the sight Friday at the Lied Recreation Center on the campus of Iowa State. There were a number of cool performances which set the stage for an anything-can-happen final day Saturday.

INTERVIEWS

Look no further than the team scores, where, on the men’s side, Texas Tech led after five of 19 events by two points over defending champ Texas by a 41-39 margin. Third-place Oklahoma (27), fourth-place Kansas (26) and fifth-place Iowa State (23) were also all in the chase.

Oklahoma State, which has never won a Big 12 indoor team title, built a slightly larger lead on the women’s side with 50 points to Texas Tech’s 41 with six of the 19 events completed.

While Logue is chasing a challenging triple – she is scheduled to run the mile and 3,000 on Saturday – her focus Friday was to be smart and think of her team. In the 5,000, she overtook Oklahoma State sophomore Gabby Hentemann in the final lap to win in 16 minutes, 10.94 seconds.

“Our whole team is just ready and strong right now,” Logue said. And so I knew that last 200 wasn’t going to use up too much in comparison for (Saturday). The goal was to run a really smart, tactical race. Just when you get to that point, you have to kind of finish well, because waiting around can be dangerous in such a high-quality field.”

Abdalla had a similar race and ran fearlessly to challenge a more experienced field. He won in 13:33.26, ahead of Iowa State junior Wesley Kiptoo (second, 13:40.77) – the defending NCAA Division 1 indoor champion – and Cyclones senior Thomas Pollard (third, 13:40.91).

Abdalla’s mark set a meet record, breaking the mark set by Colorado’s Adam Goucher, who ran 13:38.23 in 1998.

“That’s the biggest thing I’ve done at UT by far,” Abdalla said, “so I’m super happy to be able to contribute.”

The day’s other meet record belonged to Oklahoma State freshman pole vaulter Olivia Lueking.

Earlier this season, she set the school record; on Friday’s it was the meet record and a win in 14 feet, 6 inches (4.42m). She hit 14-6 on her last attempt to defeat Oklahoma State junior Ariadni Adamopoulou and Texas Tech senior Chloe Wall, who each hit 14-4 (4.37m).

“It was a really tight competition,” Lueking said. “I’ve never been in a competition that three girls were over 14-4. We all had to PR to win at 14-6. It was really exciting. I jumped 14-4, and I was just like, ‘You know what? Let’s just have fun with it.’”

Some wins Friday also continued strings of titles, including Texas’ Kristine Blazevica winning the pentathlon. It was her second straight championship and set a record for most points in meet history with 4,308.

“I didn’t expect much,” said Blazevica, who said she is focusing on nationals in two weeks with her personal-best 4,402 points. “But it turned out pretty well.”

Texas Tech senior Seasons Usual won her third consecutive weight throw, chucking her second-round attempt for a season-best 70-8.50 (21.55m). Last year, she went a little further for 70-10 (21.59m).

“I’m just happy to be able to win three years in a row,” she said. “It doesn’t really happen that often that somebody wins the same event over and over again. I’m very blessed and very happy that I was able to keep the ball rolling.”

In the women’s long jump, Texas Tech senior Ruth Usoro won her third consecutive title by leaping 21-7.50 (6.59m). It was the best mark of her three titles.

And in the men’s weight throw, Texas Tech’s Gabe Oladipo won his second consecutive indoor conference title at 71-5.25 (21.77m).

In the final events of the evening, Oklahoma State scored a sweep in the distance medleys, with a particularly rousing win by the men. Isaiah Priddey, Andrew Merutka, Alex Stitt and Alex Maier were able to edge Iowa State and anchor Chad Johnson by .02 seconds and win in 9:37.90.

It wasn’t the fastest Big 12 indoor distance medley in championship history, but it was the second-fastest performance next to Oklahoma State’s 9:37.31 mark in 2015.

Merutka was a last-second replacement on the 400-meter leg and Stitt ran his 800 in an impressive 1:54.

“I think all of our goals were to try and do as much as we could to get our final leg in contention,” Priddey said. “Because we knew he’s got a great finish, our whole goal was to get him as close as possible.”

The Oklahoma State women enjoyed a bittersweet victory, winning in 11:13.41. However, they are outside the top 12 and won’t advance to nationals.

Friday’s other two winners were Oklahoma’s Rayvon Allen in the men’s long jump at 25-10 (7.87m) and Kansas’ Zach Bradford in the men’s pole vault at 18-5.25 (5.62m).

The meet continues Saturday with completion of the field events as well as finals in sprints, hurdles and distance events that saw preliminary and semifinals heats run Friday.