Lady Vols Close East Prelims Claiming Four NCAA National Championship Berths

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The No. 25 Tennessee women's track & field team punched four tickets to the NCAA Outdoor National Championships on Saturday to wrap up the NCAA East Preliminary Rounds at Hodges Stadium. The Lady Vols will have five athletes with six entries at the national meet in Eugene, Oregon, set for June 9-12 at Hayward Field.

"Our Lady Vols have had a better outdoor NCAA run than they did indoors," head coach Beth Alford-Sullivan said. "We had three opportunities individually at the indoor national championships, and now we move into Eugene with six opportunities. So we've doubled our opportunities on the women's side to make a dent in the team standings at the national championships.

"I'm very proud of the efforts. We're a little in between right now. We had some great showings from our super seniors, some unfortunate errors, and then some up-and-coming Lady Vols doing great things early on in their careers. I'm very proud of the end result for these women. I felt our women battled today, came out with a good standing, and we'll head into Eugene with our best loaded gun we can."

TRACK STAR SURVIVES: Lady Vol super senior Maia McCoy claimed a spot at nationals in two events Saturday night, running personal-best times in both the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes. Her mark of 11.12 seconds in the 100 earned an automatic bid to Eugene as she placed second in her heat and fourth overall in the East region. In the 200, McCoy grabbed the 12th and final timed qualifying spot with her performance of 23.00 seconds.

With her new lifetime-best showings on Saturday, the Memphis native and two-time UT graduate now ranks No. 3 and No. 9 in Lady Vol history in the 100-meter and 200-meter dashes, respectively. Her mark of 11.12 in the 100 was also below the Tokyo 2020 Olympic standard of 11.15.

LLOYD OREGON BOUND: Redshirt freshman Joella Lloyd also qualified for the NCAA Championships in the 100-meter dash, turning in a time of 11.27 to place 11th at the East regional competition. Her mark made the cut for Eugene by .01 seconds, as Brandee Presley from Ole Miss clocked in at 11.28 for 12th place. North Carolina A&T sophomore Kamaya Debose-Epps was 13th at the meet with a time of 11.31, automatically clinching a berth to nationals when she placed third in the opening heat.

Tennessee was one of two schools in the East region to have multiple national qualifiers in the 100-meter dash, as North Carolina A&T also had a pair of athletes qualify.

ROOKIE RECORD PUNCHES TICKET: Vanessa Watson broke her own all-time Lady Vol freshman record in the 400-meter hurdles for the second time this week to comfortably qualify for the NCAA Outdoor Championships. Her time of 56.72 was the second-fastest mark of the East quarterfinals and ranks Watson as the No. 4 quarter-hurdler in UT history.

CLOSE CALLS: Tennessee had a pair of athletes narrowly miss the cut for nationals on Saturday. Redshirt senior Alexis Duncan was 13th in the 100-meter hurdles, turning in a time of 13.06 seconds that would have placed fifth at the 2021 West regional. Redshirt sophomore Katie Thronson placed 16th in the 3,000-meter steeplechase on Saturday in 10:14.10 to wrap up her debut season in the event.

UP NEXT: In total, the Tennessee track & field program will send 17 athletes to Eugene, Oregon, combining for 16 entries at the national showcase. The 2021 NCAA Outdoor Championships are scheduled for Wednesday through Saturday, May 9-12 at the newly renovated Hayward Field.

Full results from the 2021 NCAA East Preliminary Rounds can be found at this link. For the most up-to-date information on Tennessee track & field, follow @Vol_Track on Twitter and Instagram.

University of Tennessee Athletics

Lady Vols Close East Prelims Claiming Four NCAA National Championship Berths

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