Tucson, Ariz. – The University of Arizona track and field program is set to open their 2019 season at the NAU Friday Night Duels in Flagstaff, Ariz. on January 11th. The Cats return eight All-Americans on both the men and women's lineups.
 
"I think you see a whole level of confidence and what you will see a little more of is a level expectation," coach Fred Harvey said on the men's team. "Their expectation is to be successful, not just to be a part of competition. They have been giving each other a lot of confidence in going from event to event in recognizing that as a team, we have a great opportunity because of the high level of athletes that we have in each of the events."
 
"We have been building on the women's side," Harvey said, "and I think we are not as young in some areas. We have some really good leadership in terms of some older athletes who have preformed extremely high, and they are leading in the right way. We do have some young athletes that are in, and for lack of a better term they are going to be learning a lot about in terms of how to compete at the conference and the national level. They have great leadership at the top."
 
Sprints
The sprint crew will look to improve off of a solid 2018 campaign. Umajesty Williams etched his name in the record books during his freshman campaign, setting the freshman 400-meter dash record. At the Pac-12 Championships, Williams accounted for 12 points individually highlighted by a second place finish in the 400-meter dash. Following his freshman season, Williams qualified for the IAAF U20 World Championships with a personal best mark of 45.96 in the 400-meter dash. On the ladies side, Tatum Waggoner clocked a time of 51.89 in the 400-meter dash to set the No. 2 mark on Arizona's all-time list. Freshmen Neysia Howard and Keishawn Everly will look to make an instant impact in the sprints along with transfer Na'Asha Robinson who holds a PR of 52.00 in the 400-meter dash.
 
Coach Harvey on the men; "Those guys bring depth to the program, and high level depth. I would like to say the real key to our success in the sprints, a lot of people say that Umajesty is one of the deciding factors to how we do, but I feel real strongly that if Zakee Washington is able to preform at the level that I know he is capable of preforming, he is our key. He is our key to being a top-three team at the Pac-12 Championships or winning the Pac-12 Championships. He is that talented, he had a great fall and I think he is going to bring a lot to it. In the 100-meters, when you start looking at a guy like Keishawn, he is a guy who should be able to get into the Pac-12 Championships and be a finalist in the 100 and 200. If he is able to preform at the level he did in high school, you're looking at a major scorer."
 
Coach Harvey on the women; "The big hitters that are really going to determine what level we compete at will be Tatum, Diana, Na'Asha, Pamela will be a big factor. But a young one, Neysia Howard, is going to be a person that if she developing and doing the things that she is supposed to be doing will be a major factor in not just the 4x1, but also the 4x4. One of the events I think she can really excel at is the long jump. She was a good long jumper in high school, but with the understanding of what her upside is and her deficits are, Sheldon Blockburger is a guy who can really help bring her along to become a 20 plus foot long jumper and that is going to be huge for us at the conference meet."
 
400mH/800-meter
Freshman NCAA first team All-American Maksims Sincukovs is set to begin his second season under coach Harvey's tutelage. Sincukovs set the Arizona Freshman 400mH Record at the NCAA Championships with a time of 50.49 in the qualifying round. He did not compete in the 2018 indoor season, but finished the outdoor season finishing seventh at the NCAA Championships. On the ladies side, Karolina Pahlitzsch will return for her final season. Pahlitzch served as the second leg in the All-America 4x400-meter relay team and closed out her individual season at the NCAA West Preliminary Round. The group added Junior Olympic Champion James Smith and transfer Shannon Meisberger.
 
Coach Harvey on the men; "Obviously being a freshman All-American in the long hurdles and only having him here working for the spring semester shows what his talent level is like. Going through the fall, you are really starting to see him really excel. The great part of it is that he is focused on being one of the better hurdlers in the world, not just our conference or at the national level. He has a very young freshman, James Smith, who was the Junior Olympic champion in the 400-hurdles and they are pushing each other tremendously."
 
Coach Harvey on the women; "We went sure if we were going to get Karolina back for an additional year and the compliance office really did a tremendous job of navigating through that. She will run the 800 and 400-hurdles for us this year, once we get to the conference championship we will decide which event are we want to go with based on point potential. Shannon Meisberger, who transferred from Georgetown, is really learning a lot. I think she is going to be a real factor for us at the conference meet. I am very pleased with where her training is at this fall."
 
Distance
Carlos Villarreal will lead the distance group following an All-American finish to the 2018 indoor season and an NCAA Cross Country Championships bid. He ran a pair of sub-4 miles in back to back contests in the University of Washington's Dempsey Indoor facility and earned second team All-America honors in the mile to round out the indoor season. Villarreal continued his momentum into outdoor, running PRs in the 800 and 1500-meter runs with times of 2:12.75 in the 800 and 4:24.61 in the 1500. On the ladies side, Jennie Baragar-Petrash will lead a young core of runners. She concluded the 2018 campaign with a NCAA West Regional bid in the 1500-meter run. She concluded the 2018 cross country season as the first individual to miss out on a bit to the NCAA Championships.
 
Coach Harvey on Villarreal; "Cross country was a major plus for Carlos. He has always had the pure natural ability in terms of the 800 and the mile. With his cross country background, we feel that he is going to be competitive at 5000-meters if we want to go that route on that track with him. From a confidence point of view, he has that background training that he has been successful in cross country and it is mentally going to help him tremendously."
 
Coach Harvey on the women; "Jennie is going to be a young lady, based of what she did in cross country which I thought was fabulous, and a pure talent point of view is going to be a major player for us at the conference level for sure. Which is saying a lot, if you want to be a great 1500-meter runner in this conference, you're going to have to be one of the best 1500-meter runners in the nation. She has that ability, she had a really good cross country season and she is really confident in what her abilities are. The one young lady that we haven't had the opportunity to see yet, whether it be injuries or having to redshirt, is Kayla Young. You heard it here; Kayla Young gets very focused on being the very best athlete she can be, Kayla Young is going to be a person that is going to be that where did she come from at the Pac-12 Championships."
 
Throws
Freshman Jordan Geist will look to improve on his record setting freshman campaign in 2018. During the indoor season, Geist was named the USTFCCCA West Region Field Athlete of the Year, earned first team All-America Honors in the shot put. At the UW Invitational, Geist set his PR in the shot with a toss of 21.45m (70-4), setting the No. 1 mark in the NCAA, No. 2 mark in the world, NCAA freshman record for the shot put event, school record, and the UW Invitational record with the toss. Geist continued his momentum into the outdoor season, garnering three Pac-12 Men's Field Athlete of the Week Honors, Pac-12 Championships Athlete of the Meet, and Pac-12 Men's Freshman of the Year. Grayson Fleming and Matthew Post will look to improve on their 2018 campaign, which saw them qualify for the NCAA West Preliminary Round. On the ladies side, Jordan Spradlin returns the roster following a redshirt year. The redshirt freshman won the 2018 All-Comers Discus throw with a mark of 44.83m. Megan Dulaney and Kaelyn Shipley closed out the 2018 season at the NCAA West Preliminary Round.
 
Coach Harvey on the Geist; "Jordan, being a national level thrower, what he brings is a gentleman who at the conference level, he scored at three, but we think he has the opportunity of being a top-three guy in all of the throwing events this year. He brings great leadership to the program in terms of his work ethic. He is vocal, but he leads by example.
 
Coach Harvey on the women; "We redshirted Jordan Spradlin so she has a year of training, experience, and confidence underneath them at the collegiate level under coach crater. You can see that, the red white and blue meet was a special meet. Kaelyn threw 48.13m in the javelin. In the shot put, Amarissa Hawker threw for 14.15m. I thought that those were very good season openers."
 
Jumps
Coach Sheldon Blockbueger returns to the University of Arizona to lead All-Americans Justice Summerset and Karla Teran in the 2019 season. Teran and Summerset closed out the 2018 season with third place finishes in the conference meet. Imani Lee and PJ Austin will look to lead the men's squad in the horizontal jumps. The Cats also added two-time NCAA Div. III high jump champion Justin Lewis who holds a 2.18m (7' 1.75") PR in the event.
 
Coach Harvey on the men; "The talent speaks for itself. You always want to start there. If you want a conference champion or a national champion in any event, the talent has to be there in order to achieve that. Both of those guys are national-level All-American type high jumpers. The biggest coo on that is having Sheldon Blockburger back to be able to mentor those guys in that event area. You can just see their confidence level in what they're doing in training and how they are handling themselves as team leaders. In the horizontal jumps with Imani Lee and PJ Austin, those are two young men who in both the long jump and the triple jump that are not just going to score, but score very high at the conference level. Pj is going to be one of the bvest sprinters in our conference. It gives us a lot of diversity in how we want to put our athletes in particular events when it comes to the conference championships. It is an expectation of success."
 
Coach Harvey on the women; "You might want to look for a pretty big year from Karla. Not putting any pressure on her or anyone else, but when you think about the level of high jumpers we have within that group with Diana Romos coming in at mid year and Lillian Lowe transferring in, you could legitimately have four young ladies that high jump at six feet or better. In terms of having a training group and being able to exploit it at the highest level, without exaggeration you have four young ladies that really have an opportunity to get to the national championship. They are definitely top-8 athletes at the conference level and it is a very exciting opportunity to have that."
 
Relays
The 4x400-meter relay team consisting of Zakee Washington, Daniel Egbo, Maksisms Sincukovs, and Umajesty Williams brought home the 2018 Pac-12 title. The squad ran a time of 3:07.46 to win Arizona's first 4x400 meter relay championship. On the ladies side, the 4x100 and 4x400-meter relay teams advanced to the NCAA Championships. The 4x400-meter relay team of Diana Gajda, Karolina Pahlitzsch, Katelin Warren, and Tatum Waggoner earned second team All-America honors after a 12th place finish at the national meet. All but Warren will return for the 2019 campaign.
 
Coach Harvey on the men; "It means a lot because they learned how to win when they weren't expected to win," Harvey added on the men's relays. "They were the 'underdogs' if you will. Then you add in a guy like James Smith in the 4x4 who will be a great 4x4 leg, gives us much more depth in that area. It really solidifies what we want to do at the top end. It is a team that should be able to defend their title."
 
Coach Harvey on the women; "The expectation is that we are going to get better. The experience of being at the national championship, in theory, should allow your nerves to be a lot more relaxed and be able to handle the experience of being at a high pressure meet. Being at home, some people put a little more pressure on them, but for the most part it allows people to relax. I always tell the athletes, to talk about being at the national meet or the conference championship is one thing. Being there and experiencing it and understanding how people warm up, they're just like you. The intensity level that goes into each of the event areas, you have to experience that before you really know what its about. Being able to do that is going to hold a lot of weight."
 
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