Camryn Rogers (weight toss) and Hakim McMorris (heptathlon) to compete at NCAA Indoor Championships Fri/Sat
Cal Women's Swimming will compete in 17 individual events and 5 relays at the NCAA Championships next week
Welcome to the NCAA Championships season for Winter Sports!
While California Golden Bears will not be competing in either of the popular brackets that sports fans will fill out this March, Golden Bears will vie for other NCAA Championships in these next three weeks.
Coming up first from Albuquerque, New Mexico is the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships this weekend. Next week (Wednesday through Saturday) will be the NCAA Womenβs Swimming and Diving Championships from Knoxville, Tennessee. The week after that (also Wednesday through Saturday) will be the NCAA Menβs Swimming and Diving Championships from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Check back next week for a detailed preview of the bid of Cal Menβs Swimming and Diving to repeat as team national champion. Cal freshman diver Joshua Thai qualified for 3-meter springboard to book his spot at the NCAA on Wednesday.
Camryn Rogers will end her Cal career at the NCAA Indoor Championships
Two Golden Bears will compete on Friday and Saturday.
Three-time NCAA hammer throw champion Camryn Rogers will look to add a Weight Throw title to her splendid collegiate career. The outdoor hammer (8.82 lb or 4 kg) and indoor weight (20 lbs) are different in weight, handle length, and throwing technique. Despite dominating the outdoor hammer throw in 2019, 2021, and 2022, Rogersβ best weight toss finish came in a 3rd-place finish at the NCAA Indoor Championship in 2022; she finished 6th in the country back in 2021. The Canadian βCalympian" is seeded 4th at the NCAA this Friday.
Rogersβ top throw this year is 24.04m (78-10.5) which is just short of her career best 24.06m (78-11.25) set last year at the NCAA. Ahead of Rogers are Ole Miss throwers Jalani Davis (24.63m/80.975) and Jasmine Mitchell (24.06m/78-11.25) and Minnesota newcomer Shelby Frank (24.14m/79-2.5). Davis fouled out last year while Mitchell edged Rogers for 2nd place.
Given Camryn Rogersβ wealth of competition experience, one would expect Rogers to set a new career best on Friday. We shall see if she can capture that elusive weight throw title in her final competition as a Cal Bear (Rogers had used up her outdoor eligibility already).
Because the outdoor hammer throw is an Olympic event but the indoor weight throw is not, it makes a lot of sense for Camryn Rogers to focus on the Olympic event. Rogers owns the top-11 throws in NCAA history for hammer throw and had already improved on her 5th-place finish at the delayed Tokyo Olympic Games in 2021 to be a medal contender at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. This weekend will certainly not be the last time that we write about Camryn Rogers here at WFC.
Joining Camryn Rogers in New Mexico is senior Hakeem McMorris, who will make his indoor heptathlon debut after also competing at last yearβs outdoor decathlon on the NCAA Championships stage. McMorris, the younger brother of football and track & field duel athlete turned current football graduate assistant Malik, is seeded 12th. His season best score of 5870 is a bit short of that of field leaders Georgia's Kyle Garland (NCAA-leading 6415 points), Arkansasβ Ayden Owens-Delerme (6237 points) and Texasβ Leo Neugebauer (6097 points) who placed 2nd, 1st, and 3rd at the NCAA Indoor 2022. Hurdles and Long Jump are the best events for the multi-talented Hakeem McMorris.
ESPN+ will broadcast the 2023 NCAA Indoor Championships live. NCAA will hopefully update this page with the relevant links. Live results can be found here.
After a trying season outside of the pool, Cal Womenβs Swimming (and Diving although Cal did not have any female diver on the roster amid the offseason chaos) will look to continue their streak of a top-10 team finish at the NCAA Championships.
Cal will have 9 individuals racing in 17 events in addition all 5 relays at Knoxville, Tennessee next week. The full list of the Cal events and their Psych Sheet rankings in parentheses is below. This is a reminder that only the top-16 finishers of each event will score points.
Lizzy Cook β 200 fly (20)
Emma Davidson β 100 free (31)
Rachel Klinker β 500 free (26), 200 fly (8)
Mia Kragh β 100 fly (20)
Annika McEnroe β 100 back (23), 200 back (19)
Mia Motekaitis β 200 free (12), 200 back (26)
Leah Polonsky β 200 IM (7), 400 IM (9), 200 fly (17)
Ayla Spitz β 200 free (30), 500 free (22)
Isabelle Stadden β 100 back (4), 200 back (2), 200 IM (18)
Relays - 200 medley relay (9), 800 free relay (8), 200 free relay (14), 400 medley relay (13), 400 free relay (14)
Swimswam scored the Psych Sheet and had Cal in 10th place, just ahead of Indiana. Cal Bears will need to outperform their Psych Sheet to hold off Indiana with the Hoosiersβ diving. In fact, Cal will likely need to improve on the Psych Sheet to hold off Pac-12 rival (for now still) USC thanks to the Trojansβ strong diving.
Golden Bears did not improve on the Psych Sheet at the NCAA in 2022. But with Dave Durden and David Marsh in charge this year, I do think an improvement at the National Championships is a good bet. Cal also got plenty of rooms to improve in the double-pointed relays.
Individually, Isabelle Stadden in 200 backstroke is the best bet to finish atop the podium. It is a bit sad now to see the optimism that I injected in my 2022 recap, but Rachel Klinker finished 6th in 200 butterfly last year. Ayla Spitz and 2x 2023 Pac-12 champion Leah Polonsky also scored points as individual as B-Finalists.
ESPN+ will also have the entire coverage of this NCAA Championships.
GO BEARS!
Camryn Rogers fouled on all three of her throws attempts on Friday. Nonetheless, the hammer rather than the weight is her event and we shall be seeing her best there next year in Paris for the Olympics.