Alabama Men's Track Heads to SEC Indoor Championships
2/26/2004 12:00:00 AM
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Months of training and preparation will all come together this weekend as the University of Alabama men’s track and field team heads to Lexington, Kentucky for the 2004 SEC Indoor Championships.
Heading into the meet, Tide sophomore Peter Etoot is the lone NCAA qualifier but the young Bama athletes have been close to obtaining more qualifying marks.
Sophomore Chauncey Harris has posted times that have hit all around a qualifying time but has not been able to cross the threshold yet. Harris has recorded two times that are listed in the school’s All-Top 10 marks in both the 60m and 200m.
Overall this season, Bama athletes have posted eight times or marks that at the time of the event ranked in the Top 10 all-time in UA history in that particular event. In addition to Harris’s two times, Steven Boozer posted two Top 10 times in the weight throw, Alex Korir posted two Top 10 times in the 5k, Etoot posted a Top 10 time in both the 800 and the mile and Jeff Fedler posted a Top 10 time in the mile run as well.
“Our guys are ready,” said Alabama Head Coach Harvey Glance. “They’ve faced the best competition all year long and I don’t think any of them will be overwhelmed by the talent they’ll be facing this weekend.”
The SEC Track and Field Championships, both indoor and outdoor, are essentially a “Who’s Who among Track All-Americans and Olympians” and while Glance is excited about the potential of his young squad it can be equally frustrating at a meet of this magnitude because of the quality of the field.
“Our team is so young and this is not the conference to be developing in,” said Glance. “While we’re trying to coach these young kids and bring them along it’s so difficult to do when your conference is so good. You could battle for last place, or second to last place in the SEC and go to another conference and win it or finish second.”
Alabama will be competing for its sixth overall SEC Indoor Championship while at the same time adding to its 77 individual SEC Championships with Etoot’s championship in the 800m at the 2003 Indoor Championship being the latest. Alabama has also had three athletes claim the prestigious Commissioner’s Trophy for the highest point scorer in the meet four times with the late David Kimani earning the title in 2001 and 2002.
The meet is scheduled to begin at 5:15 p.m. on Friday with heptathlon events and will wrap up on Sunday at approximately 4:55 p.m. with the men’s 1,600m relay. All times are Eastern.
