Aliyah Gustafson Competes For National Championship Thursday

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Gustafson overcomes injury to qualify for NCAA Track & Field Championship (Story by Bob Cunningham, BGSU.edu)

Eugene, Ore. – Redshirt sophomore Aliyah Gustafson is one of 24 student-athletes who will compete for a national championship in the shot put Thursday evening at historic Hayward Field on the campus of the University of Oregon.

The NCAA Division I Outdoor Track and Field National Championships begin Wednesday and the shot put takes place Thursday at 9:30 pm ET. ESPN will air live coverage from 8-10:30 pm that evening and ESPN3 will have coverage from 1:30-11:30 pm.

"She competes in the middle of the track during the middle of the meet," BGSU Track and Field Coach Lou Snelling said. "It's prime time and that's a huge experience. You can't buy that kind of experience and it should be really valuable for her down the road."

In her first year of collegiate outdoor track and field, Gustafson has dominated the Mid-American Conference in the shot put. She was ranked as the top shot putter in the MAC for most of the season and won the conference championship with a personal best throw of 51-feet-4.5. She was seeded No. 19 of the 48 qualifiers at the NCAA East Region Preliminary Round, needing to finish among the top 12 to advance to the national championships.

At that meet, Gustafson twice threw a new personal best, finishing with a career-long 53-0.75 and placing 12^th to earn the last spot to the national championships. The top 12 finishers from the East and the top 12 finishers from the West make up the final field of 24. As the No. 24 seed, Gustafson will compete in the first flight of 12 competitors in Oregon.

"It's really hard to go to the East prelim for the first time and qualify for nationals," Snelling said. "She's a gamer. She stepped up at conference. She stepped up when it really mattered at the East prelim. That makes you feel like she can handle this experience and that it will generally go well."

With Gustafson's qualification, it marks the fourth consecutive year in which a Falcon will represent the University at the National Championships. It is just the second time in program history that BGSU has competed at the Division I Outdoor Track and Field National Championships in four straight years as the Falcons also did so from 1992-95. Prior to the current stretch, no Falcon had advanced that far since Kerri McClung in the shot put in 2005. Ironically, McClung held the school record until Gustafson broke it with her performance at the NCAA East Prelim.

"You like to see that continuity," Snelling said. "We'd like to have more of a presence there as we move forward. That would be a nice place to get to soon. What (throws coach) Matt Conly has been able to do has been very impressive."

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