A few days before the NCAA Track & Field Championships, Texas A&M coach Pat Henry spoke highly of a 4x400 team that willed itself to victory.
"They won that because they have a great heart just to win that relay. That's it," Henry said. "These two [other] kids are fighting and this guy out-leans them right at the line. It was a tremendous performance by their anchor leg. That was the heart for that race, the emotion that's involved."
The foursome and race Henry was speaking of was the rival Baylor Bears' 4x400 team at the Midwest Regional.
It was a Bears' team that "should not have won it," if one goes by previous times and individual accomplishments. As a track aficionado, Henry appreciated how the Bears approached and then executed in a race they have great pride in.
After Saturday, Henry can insert his own men's 4x400 squad into a similar scenario and use the same accolades.
Needing at least a third-place finish to, at worst, tie for the men's team national title, the Aggie foursome dismissed any rankings -- they had the fifth-best time coming in -- and brought the baton home in second to capture their first NCAA title and match the feat secured less than an hour earlier by their more decorated teammates, the A&M women.
In doing so, the Aggies tied a school record of 3:00.91 and beat third-place Baylor, which for the first time in three years -- a stretch of 42 races -- did not finish first in a collegiate 4x400 race.
Henry, who talks more about form, execution, preparation and anything else connected with an event than the time or distance, couldn't have been more proud of the four men that put some earlier team mishaps behind them to secure the title.
Tran Howell gave the Aggies the start they needed to have hope for the remainder of the race. Howell handed off at the front to Bryan Miller, who dropped off the pace when the runners left their lanes on the back stretch.
Miller, the lone Aggie to make the individual 400 final, gained ground from that point on handing off tied for second to fellow Texan Kyle Dykhuizen. The sophomore from Plano stepped in front of the Baylor runner just as he received the baton. He stayed out of trouble the remainder of the way while extending the lead over the Bears before giving the baton to senior Justin Oliver with only one mission -- to keep the order status quo.
Oliver, a star 400 runner for the Aggies since he arrived from Stone Mountain, Ga., did just that, running within himself and not worrying about catching the NCAA champion in the 400, Jonathan Borlee of Florida State.
Running a 44.2 split, Oliver crossed the finish line comfortably ahead of the Bears and, more importantly, everyone else but Florida State. He pointed to the stands as he did, knowing the Aggies were champions and Henry had a new 4x400 story to tell.
Richard Croome's e-mail address is richard.croome@theeagle.com.
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