Gene's Blog: Sprinter Jager makes history with relay sweep

June 09, 2009

Not only did the Tommies make Minnesota history with their 4x100 and 4x400 relay victories May 23 at the NCAA Track and Field Championships, but they also achieved a Division III first.

St. Thomas won the first NCAA track relay by any Minnesota college or university men’s team when it took first place in the 4x100. The Toms cruised to victory in 40.76 with James Ewer, junior Sam Moen, Joe DeFrance and Pat Jager. 

Three hours later sophomore Matt Griswold joined Ewer, DeFrance and Jager to win the 4x400 in 3:10.60, a new school record. Phil Bastron ran with Ewer, DeFrance and Jager to record the fastest 4x400 time in the prelims.

Jager became the first Division III runner to anchor two relays to NCAA titles on the same day in the 36-year history of outdoor national meets. That’s never been done in Division I men’s track, and has happened just three times in Division II men’s track.

Approximately a dozen NCAA Division I, II and III teams have recorded the 4x100 and 4x400 same-day sweep since NCAA championships were sponsored in the mid-1960s, but most did it with different anchors.

Also, St. Thomas joined Frostburg State (Mass.) and McMurry (Tex.) as the only three current Division III institutions to win an NCAA 4x100 relay on both the women’s and men’s side.

Jager won six All-America honors this calendar year in national meets in March and May (relays and open 400 meters). Only one other Tommie athlete has won six or more All-America honors in one year -– UST Athletic Hall of Famer Leonard Jones was a seven-time All-American both as a sophomore and as a junior in 1992 and 1993.

The Tommies have now won 49 individual and three relay national championships in men’s and women’s track and field. St. Thomas went six seasons without an NCAA champion from 1998-2003 but have now crowned nine NCAA track and field champs in the last six seasons.

In team placings, St. Thomas now have 89 top-five NCAA finishes in all sports in its 27-year affiliation with the NCAA. That includes 29 in men’s and women’s track and field. St. Thomas also has 99 conference team titles in men’s and women’s track and field.

Theisen gets honor

It was announced today that Katie Theisen was chosen to represent the conference on the national ballot for the NCAA Woman of the Year program.

A six-time All-American, Theisen capped her career on May 22 with an NCAA runner-up finish in the steeplechase. It was her third career national runner-up placing, as she previously anchored two distance medley relays to second at the NCAA indoor meet.

Theisen, who graduated with a 4.00 grade-point average and is headed to medical school, also contributed to 263 team points in eight career conference track and field meets to help the Tommies win all eight indoor and outdoor championships in her era. She also placed 71st, 36th, 20th and 13th in her four NCAA cross country championship races.

An NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship recipient, a Goldwater Scholar and a CoSIDA Academic All-American, Theisen also has a deep campus- and community-service resume. She was named College Sporting News' Senior Female Student-Athlete of the Year from the MIAC.

In July, the NCAA will cut its list to 30 semifinalists (10 each in D-I, D-II, D-III), and in August a pool of nine national finalists will be announced. Last year, three-time softball All-American Maria Bye of St. Thomas was the MIAC representative and made the cut to 30.

Coming and going

UW-LaCrosse has dropped its varsity teams in baseball and men’s tennis as part of its search to find $400,000 in university-wide cuts. That leaves just six Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference schools that offer baseball, as UW-Eau Claire and UW-River Falls dropped the sport in the last decade.

Cost cutting is in the news each week at the Division I level. A new hot-button Division I issue is the push to eliminate printed media guides and rely on online access only. Ohio State and Michigan recently had a joint media announcement to announce plans to publish guides online only, and Wisconsin and Iowa State followed suit. The Pac Ten Conference has announced several legislative proposals.

Meanwhile, there’s a ripple of growth in varsity lacrosse programs in the region. Concordia-Wisconsin, Milwaukee School of Engineering, and Aurora (Ill.) will add men’s and/or women’s lacrosse teams for 2010-11. Both are spring sports in NCAA Division III. Previously, only five schools west of Indiana and Michigan sponsored varsity lacrosse -- Carthage (Wis.) men, North Central (Ill.) women, plus three schools west of the Mississippi River, Fontbonne of St. Louis, Colorado College and Whittier (Calif.).

The Midwest Lacrosse Conference will debut next spring with teams from five states -- Carthage Milwaukee School of Engineering, Trine (Ind.), Adrian (Mich.), Albion (Mich.), Mt. St. Joseph (Ohio).

Local flavor

Eleven of the 22 players now on the St. Paul Saints roster played college baseball for schools from Minnesota, Iowa and North Dakota. That group includes six MIAC alums -– St. Thomas' Lonnie Robinson (RHP), St. Olaf’s Charlie Ruud (RHP) and Andrew Schmiesing; (OF); and Hamline’s Andrew Bennett (3B), Kyle Foster (RHP) and Dan Kaczrowski (SS).

Robinson (shown at right), a 2008 All-American pitcher for the Tommies, is 1-0 in five appearances this season out of the bullpen. He also pitched last summer with the Saints.

St. Scholastica alum Mark Moriarity (RHP) joined the team Monday. The list also includes Gopher alum Kerry Lightenberg (RHP), Concordia-St. Paul grad Chris Herbert (catcher), St. Ambrose (Iowa) grad Mitch Wylie (RHP), and Jamestown grad Brent Krause (OF).

One MIAC grad is currently playing major-league baseball -- Concordia-Moorhead alum Chris Coste, who received a World Championship ring last fall with Philadelphia, is in his fourth season as a catcher with the Phillies.

Final days

If you wanted to get one last photo of an intact Schoenecker Arena and Coughlan Fieldhouse, you need to hurry. Both complexes have been gutted and will be knocked down in the coming hours. Chain-link fence has swallowed half of UST's large parking lot at Cretin and Snelling, and the walls to those athletic venues soon will come tumbling down.

Plans have been finalized to play Tommie volleyball matches in 2009 and 2010 as well as UST men's and women's basketball games three miles east of campus at the Gangelhoff Center at Concordia-St. Paul.

Tuesday June 9 demolition photos