A sophomore sprinter from the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff will compete for a national championship on Friday.
Jordan Pierre qualified for the 400-meter dash finals during Wednesday’s preliminaries at the NCAA Division I Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon.
Pierre ran a personal best 45.44 seconds, tying Arizona State sophomore Jayden Davis for the eighth best time out of 24 runners.
The top two runners in each of three heats qualified automatically for the finals, with the next best three times overall also advancing. The 400-meter finals will be held Friday at 8:02 p.m. Central on ESPN.
Pierre finished fourth in the opening heat. After the second heat, he was tentatively sitting in the final qualifying spot, meaning Pierre needed the third-place runner from the final heat to run a slower time than he had.
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That runner, Navy junior Nathan Kent, finished 0.02 seconds behind Pierre’s time, clearing his path to Friday’s finals.
Of note, Florida State freshman Micahi Danzy, the No. 1-ranked 400-meter runner in the nation, was a late scratch on Wednesday. He was scheduled to compete in Pierre’s heat in an adjacent lane.
Alabama sophomore Samuel Ogazi finished with the fastest time, 44.77. Ogazi, Pierre and Davis will join runners from South Florida, Southern California, Texas Tech, Duke, Texas A&M and UCLA in the finals.
Pierre can earn first-team All-American honors if he finishes in the top eight on Friday but is guaranteed no worse than second team.
He will be UAPB’s only finalist, but he was not the only Golden Lion to compete Wednesday and earn All-American status.
The UAPB men’s 4×100-meter relay team finished third in the opening heat of the night, one spot shy of automatic qualification behind Tennessee and USC. The Golden Lions’ time of 39.27 was 0.29 seconds slower than their run in the quarterfinals two weeks ago in College Station, Texas.
Five teams beat UAPB’s time in the second heat, and six teams did so in the final heat.
The Golden Lions finished with the 14th best time overall. That was enough for senior Jared Sylvester, senior Dwight Henry, junior Ross Walrond and freshman Avindale Smith to earn second-team All-American honors, but not enough to be among the nine teams in Friday’s finals.
Auburn tied the meet record with a 37.97-second run, finishing with the best time. South Florida, LSU, Minnesota, Tennessee, Arkansas, Kentucky and USC were the others to advance to Friday. USC’s 38.71 was the slowest time to qualify.
UAPB finished better than seven schools from Power Four conferences, including two from the Southeastern Conference.