St. Peter, Minn. – The NCAA Division III Men’s and Women’s Track and Field Committee announced Monday the participants in the 2013 NCAA Division III Men’s and Women’s Indoor Track and Field Championships. Representing Gustavus Adolphus College at this year’s NCAA Championships will Cameron Clause (Jr., Mankato, Minn.), Josh Owens (Sr., Brooklyn Park, Minn.), and Allyson Voss (Sr., Wausau, Wis.).
The championships will be held March 8-9 at North Central College in Naperville, Ill. For more information on the upcoming NCAA Championships, North Central College has set up a web page dedicated to the event.
For each woman’s individual event contested, including the pentathlon, the top 15 declared student-athletes were accepted into the competition. For each men’sindividual event contested, including the heptathlon, the top 13 declared student-athletes were accepted into the competition. For each relay event contested, the top 10 declared relay teams, one per institution, were accepted into the competition.
Gustavus senior pole vaulter Josh Owens will be making his second career appearance at the NCAA Indoor Championships after becoming the first Gustavus athlete to ever qualify for the meet in the pole vault competition last season. At last year’s national meet, Owens finished ninth after clearing a height of 15-feet 9.25-inches. The senior will head to Naperville ranked seventh in the country with a height of 16-feet 1.25-inches, which he cleared at the Ted Nelson Classic on Feb. 2. Owens is most recently coming off his second consecutive MIAC title in the pole vault, clearing 15-feet 4.25-inches on Saturday in Northfield. Also a third place finisher in the event as a sophomore, Owens became the first Gustie to win the pole vault back-to-back years at the conference championships.
Cameron Clause and Allyson Voss will each be competing at the NCAA Indoor Championships for the first time in their careers. Clause will take part in the heptathlon competition after his breakout performance at the MIAC Multis this past weekend. Clause posted a second place finish in the MIAC heptathlon after totaling 4,781 points over two days. He was edged by St. Thomas’s Gavin Yseth who totaled 4,797 points to win gold. His score this past weekend broke Gustavus’s school record previously held by Drew Hood `08 set in 2008. Clause enters the NCAA Championships ranked 11th following his score last weekend.
Allyson Voss also solidified her place on the Gustavus Record Board with her performance this past weekend at the MIAC Championships. Voss successfully defended her 2012 crown with another first place finish in the pole vault. The senior cleared the bar at 12-feet 4.5-inches to break both the meet record and school record. The former meet and school records were held by Gustie Janna Castellano `07 and were set in 2007. Castellano’s meet record was 12-feet 2-inches while her school record stood at 12-feet 3.5-inches. Not only was Voss the first Gustie to ever win the event in back-to-back seasons, she is also the first Gustie to win two conference titles in the pole vault. The Wausau, Wis. product enters nationals ranked eighth with her height from this past weekend.
The 2013 NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships will begin on Friday at 10:00 a.m. with the men’s weight throw. Voss will compete in the pole vault at 11:00 a.m. CST on Friday, while Owens will begin later in the day at 3:30 p.m. The heptathlon will be taking place at various times throughout the weekend. For a complete schedule of events and participant list, please follow the link below.