Brown defends national title; Buffs earn 10 All-Americans

BROOKINGS, S.D. (March 7, 2020) – Rasheem Brown won his third NAIA national title by successfully defending the national championship of the 60-meter hurdles, Tim Thacker and Gabrielle Mardis claimed national championship runners-up, and the Milligan College track & field team earned 10 All-Americans on the final day of the 2020 NAIA Indoor Track & Field National Championships.

The three-day event concluded Saturday at South Dakota State University's Sanford-Jackrabbit Athletic Complex with Milligan landing in the top 20 on both the men's and women's sides.

"We knew we were coming into this meet with a few folks in the hunt, but I thought we could have even scored a few more points across the board," Head Coach Chris Layne said, "but of course I'm extremely pleased with how we competed and how things finished up."

Facts and tallies

Milligan finished the national championships ninth with 25 points on the men's side and 20th with 14 points on the women's side. This marked the highest-ever national finish as a team on the men's side and the 30th and 31st national team finishes inside the top 25. The men were seeded 14th coming in but jumped five spots and finished as the top program from the Appalachian Athletic Conference.

The day featured five Buffs to finish inside the top four in their events. Following Brown, Thacker (mile) and Mardis (3k), Nathan Baker took third in the men's 3k and Katlyn Haas took fourth in the women's 3k. Bekah Owen and the men's distance medley relay crew of Sam Wehner, Ronan Philippot, Alex Windham and Thacker rounded out the All-American efforts with eighth-place finishes in the 5k and DMR, respectively.

Milligan cross-country and track & field has now earned 99 All-Americans since restarting the program in 2000. Additionally, this year's Buffs matched what the 2007 indoor team accomplished with 10 All-Americans, which is the most All-Americans from Milligan at one national championship event.

Layne's program has now produced nine national champions.

Rasheem Brown, 60-meter hurdles national champion

Brown earned Layne's program the ninth national title, and he did it in record fashion. Entering the final with the fastest preliminary time at 7.81 from Friday, Brown crushed the rest of the field with a blistering 7.70 mark in Saturday's final, winning the race by 0.21 seconds. Brown's mark re-set his own NAIA record, which was 7.81 at last year's indoor meet. It also improved his own Milligan record and marked his third national title through three national championships.

"To win, set a national record, school record and personal best in a national championship final is really all you could ask for," Layne said of Brown. "There is nothing else we could have asked of him. Rasheem is invested in his trade and it shows. I also have to mention how well he and assistant coach Alyssa Younker have worked together in fine tuning the little things necessary as you progress in that event."

Tim Thacker, mile runner-up

In the mile, Thacker matched Brown with a Milligan record and personal best, as he finished as the national runner-up for the second year in a row after running one of the best races of his career.

Thacker's time of 4:06.70 was 0.61 seconds off Olivet Nazarene's Wesley Meyer (4:06.09), the race's No. 1 seed entering the competition. In fact, Meyer and Thacker came in as No. 1 and No. 2 with times almost five seconds faster than anyone else in the NAIA. In the championship final, they beat their previous bests of this season by over four seconds and finished three and a half seconds faster than the rest of the championship field.

"The men's mile was one of the best races I've seen at a national meet in a long time," Layne said. "There's nothing else Tim could have done and to come out of this meet with a five second personal best, the school record and a 4:06 mile is pretty rewarding. The young man from ONU is a great athlete, and those were two really good athletes going at it."

Gabrielle Mardis, 3k runner-up | Katlyn Haas fourth

Following the trend of success Brown and Thacker had put on display in Milligan's first two events of the day, Mardis and Haas followed suit in the 3000 meter final. Mardis, pre-race seeded at No. 13, improved from her sixth-place finish in the event at last year's national championship and landed the runner-up with a time of 10:13.03, second only to SCAD Atlanta's Emily Kearney, the AAC cross country runner of the year and two-time indoor national champion.

Haas, the No. 4 seed, ran 10:16.47 to claim fourth place.

"We talked about how anything can happen if you just get to the final, and I think that was evident in the women's 3k with Gabby and Katlyn's effort," Layne said. "Overall, this is a really special group of you men and young women, and I'm proud to have them represent this program."

More All-American efforts | Wrapping up indoor season

Baker, Owen and the men's DMR also earned All-American at this year's championship meet. Baker ran the third fastest time in the 3k, crossing the finish line in 8:29.84. It was a hair off his personal best of 8:29.70, which he set when he won the 2018 indoor title as a freshman. Owen ran to an eighth-place finish in the 5k with a time of 17:55.39. Wehner, Philippot, Windham and Thacker represented the Milligan men's DMR which also took eighth in 10:22.92.

The meet also featured a few Buffs who wrapped up their indoor season at the national championships, including Jake Crow and Avery DeWolf who were finalists. Crow, seeded No. 17, finished 12th behind Baker in the 3k with a time of 8:50.85. DeWolf crossed the line in 12th place, matching her seed, in 18:31.88.

Wrapping up the competing Buffs was Tons Ferguson who took 14th in the men's triple jump with a mark of 14.18 meters.

Moving forward

With indoor season complete, the Buffs will next turn their attention to outdoor season, which will run through March, April and May. The AAC Championships are set for April 24-25 while the NAIA Championships are set for May 20-22.