MIRAMAR, Fla. – ULM senior Daniel Mutai continued his impressive weekend as he blew away the field to win the 3,000-meter steeplechase Saturday on day two of the Sun Belt Outdoor Track & Field Championships at the Ansin Sports Complex.
Mutai cruised to the victory with a personal-best time of 9:04.79 in the night cap of Saturday's action to earn his second title in three years in the event. It marked the second straight day that Mutai has scored big for the Warhawk men as he also placed second in the 10,000-meter run on Friday evening. He will look to add to his point total on the final day of competition Sunday in the 5,000-meter run.
The ULM men enter the final day in a tie for fifth place with Western Kentucky with 22 team points. Arkansas State leads the competition with 45 points, followed by Middle Tennessee (40 points), North Texas (31 points) and South Alabama (26 points).
Sophomore Isaac Grieder got the scoring started early for the Warhawks with a fifth-place in the decathlon on Saturday morning. Grieder recorded a personal-best total of 6,713 points to earn four team points.
The Warhawk men also had several athletes qualify for event finals, including a stellar performance by sophomore Jamel Sams in the 400-meter hurdle preliminaries. Sams clocked a personal-best time of 51.98 to place second in the event -- a time that ranks in the top 20 in the East Region this season. Junior Martin Solomon also qualified for the 400 hurdle finals, finishing in fifth place in a time of 52.83.
Martin qualified for his second final of the day with a fifth-place effort in the 110-meter hurdles, running a personal-best time of 14.46.
Senior Dimitri Hampton qualified for the 400-meter dash final with a season-best time of 47.98 to finish seventh, while freshman Nigel Cribbs narrowly missed a spot in the finals with a 10th-place finish in a time of 48.10.
On the women's side, senior Danielle O'Donnell scored points in two events with a sixth-place finish in the heptathlon (4,654 points) and a tie for sixth place in the final of the high jump (1.67 meters).
Sophomore Teona Glave also put herself in good shape for the 800-meter final with a seventh-place finish in the preliminaries. Glave clocked a time of 2:13.93.
The final day of the Sun Belt Championships begins Sunday at 9 a.m. CT with the men's hammer throw and concludes at 7 p.m. CT with men's 4x400-meter relay final.
