Track & Field Travels to University of Arkansas for NCAA Outdoor Championships

June 8, 2009

Clemson, SC – Five sprinters and a decathlete from Clemson’s track & field program will make the trip to Fayetteville, AR today to ready for this week’s NCAA Outdoor Championships, scheduled for June 10-13 at John McDonnell Field. Clemson’s qualifiers include previous outdoor All-Americans in C.J. Spiller, as well as first-time participants Trenton Guy, Miller Moss, Justin Murdock, and Kristine Scott.

In total, the Tigers will compete in four events. Ford, Murdock, and Spiller qualified in both the 100m dash and 4x100m relay, while Guy will compete with the relay. Ford, an outdoor All-American last season in the 100m with a fifth-place finish, is ranked #2 in the event heading into this week’s meet. Most recently, he captured his first individual East Region championship with a 10.04 in the 100m final in Greensboro, NC on May 30.

Ford is looking to complete a rare sweep of the short sprints at the indoor and outdoor NCAA nationals. He won the 60m dash at the NCAA Indoor Championships in March. The first round (7:15 PM Eastern) and semifinals (8:40 PM) of the 100m dash are scheduled for Wednesday, June 10.

The Royal Palm Beach, FL native will be joined in the event by football teammate Spiller and first-year freshman Murdock. This is the first qualification in the 100m dash at nationals for both athletes. However, Spiller previously earned All-America recognition as a freshman in 2007 with the seventh-place 4x100m relay.

The 4×1 prelims will also be held Wednesday (6:15 PM). Clemson comes into the event with momentum, thanks to a first-place finish at the East Region Championships two weekends ago. Clemson’s lineup of Murdock, Spiller, Guy, and Ford put together a school-record time of 38.78, which ranks #2 among the 18 relay groups in the field this week.

The first action of the meet will be the decathlon (12:30 PM), featuring first-time NCAA participant Miller Moss. He ranks sixth on the all-time performance list in the decathlon for Clemson with 7,323 points. Moss is a former ACC runner-up (2008) in the 10-event competition. Moss will compete in the first five events Wednesday: 100m dash, long jump, shot put, high jump, and 400m dash. The final five events will be held Thursday, June 11.

Scott earned an at-large berth for the first time in the women’s 200m dash. She finished 10th at the NCAA East Regional. A junior from Orlando, FL, Scott finished fourth in the event at the ACC Championships in April. She is the first women’s student-athlete from Clemson to compete in the 200m dash since Shekera Weston in 2001. She is scheduled for the first round (7:10 PM) and semifinals (8:35 PM) on Thursday.

All of Clemson’s action will be webcast live on ArkansasRazorbacks.com or by visiting the track & field home page on NCAA.com.