Men's track team sets records at Harvard

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by Ben Glassman

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It was cold last weekend in both Cambridge, Mass., and here in Houston, but the men's track and field team began to heat up at events in both cities. In the process, school records fell, and several Owls qualified provisionally for the NCAA indoor meet.

The first stop was the Harvard Select Indoor. The Owls traveled north hoping to find stiff competition for the then-undefeated distance-medley team and to take advantage of Harvard's banked track. The results were favorable.

Junior Dan Brooks said, "The quality of the meet at Cambridge wasn't quite as good as we had hoped, since Stanford and a couple of other good teams we thought were going to be there weren't. But it was a good, fast, banked track, and we put up some pretty good times."

Among those times was junior Quinton Milner's 48.43 and first-place finish in the 400 meters. It was his best time this year.

"I'm pretty happy with the way I ran," Milner said. "I'm running faster now than I did last year. As far as my conditioning goes, I also think that I'm in better shape now."

The mile-relay team also won its event. The provisionally qualifying time of 3:12.58 blew away the competition by more than 10 seconds.

"After the first leg, the race, as such, was over," Head Coach Ray Davidson said. "It was a time-trial from then on."

Rice's other relay team, the distance medley, entered the meet without having been seriously challenged this year, but they encountered stiff opposition from Harvard University.

Although the Crimson won the event, Rice kept pace and recorded a time of 9:53.80. When this race, run in yards, was converted to the meter standard, it translated to a new school record at 9:50.81 and another provisional qualification.

Freshman Jaime Price continued to improve in the event. "We told him that if anyone passed him, just stay on him and then blow him off the track, and that's exactly what he did," Davidson said.

Price also competed in one of the most exciting races of the meet, the 800 meters.

"When he ran in both the distance medley and the 800 last week, he was a little tired and only managed 1:56," Davidson said. "So this time we told him that if he was tired he should just be a rabbit for Brian [Klein], but he said he felt good and ended up running a great race."

Junior Brian Klein, who himself had run a leg in the mile relay, entered the 800 as the favorite and did not disappoint. His first-place provisional finish of 1:50.93 made him the lone individual qualifier for Rice. But Klein had to duel with Price, who finished just behind him in second with a time of 1:51.77.

Senior Luis Armenteros put up eye-catching numbers. Racing against top competition in the 3,000 meters, Armenteros far surpassed his personal best in the event, registering a second-place finish in 8:20.71, only 0.25 seconds out of first.

"Luis was running against a guy who's among the best in the nation," Davidson said. "I don't know how hard he was trying, but he was running at a pretty good clip, and Luis stayed right with him. It is remarkable to set a personal record like that with such dramatic results on an indoor track."

The Owls then returned to Houston and some members of the team participated in the Cougar Invitational at the University of Houston.

Rice collected 26 points to finish seventh. The top performers were in the field events.

Chad Kopp cleared 6-8 to place second in the high jump, and Kodili Odimgbe put the shot 51-9 1/4 for a second place finish.

Armenteros followed up his 3,000 performance at Harvard by running 1:56.93 in the 800-meter dash, landing fifth place.

Other scorers for Rice were freshmen Ross Andres, who took fourth in the high jump with a 6-6 effort, and Drexell Owusu, whose mark of 49 3/4 earned him fourth in the triple jump.

The success pleased Davidson. "We went up to Harvard hoping to qualify in three events, and we did that," he explained. "Obviously, we would have preferred automatic times, but I'm happy with the provisional standards."

Tomorrow's Oklahoma Classic in Oklahoma City will be Rice's last tune-up before the Southwest Conference Indoor Championships, which will take place Feb. 16-17.

This item appeared in the Sports section of the February 9, 1996 issue.

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