Shareese Woods Earns All-America Award With 6th Place Finish in 200 Dash
June 10, 2006
Sacramento, Calif. - Charlotte 49ers junior Shareese Woods (Fort Lee, Va./Prince George) earned All-America status with a sixth-place finish in the 200-meter championship race on Saturday at the 2006 NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships at Hornet Stadium, giving her the best national showing in women's program history. The race was televised live on CBS, and closed out a record-breaking NCAA Championship meet for the 49ers' program.
Also on Saturday at the post-meet awards ceremony, head coach Robert Olesen received his U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Southeast District Outdoor Coach of the Year award, while Associate Head Coach Tim Hall found out that he has been named East Region Outdoor Assistant Coach of the Year for sprints and hurdles.
The Niners posted five top-25 finishes at the Championships, including two All-Americans. Charlotte runners competed in six races, finishing 6th, 11th, 13th (three times), and 25th. Charlotte had competitors in two different national championship races.
But the focus on Saturday was Woods, who finished sixth in the 200 with a time of 23.26 seconds while running into a slight headwind out of lane two. That is the best women's finish in program history and ties her with Will Montgomery (2001 outdoor men's long jump) for the all-time best finish for Charlotte's track & field teams.
Shalonda Solomon of South Carolina was the NCAA Champion with a time of 22.62 seconds, followed by competitors from Auburn, LSU, USC, Houston and then Woods. There were nine competitors in the championship race overall.
|
|
 |
"I'm my worst critic," said Woods, "and I always look back on races and find something that I could have corrected. But today I think it went really well, and I did my best. I didn't sacrifice the gift God gave me by not doing my best. My main goal was to make some noise at the national level ... we've been here, and this is the biggest number of competitors we've had at nationals. I wanted everyone to know that we weren't a school anyone can 'sleep on' or ignore."
As happened a few other times earlier in the week, the start of Saturday's championship race was delayed by a train running past the Alex G. Spanos Sports Complex. The starters called the competitors up from their set starting positions and had them wait a few seconds while the train moved past, with the thinking being that a runner could react to the sound of the train rather than the starter's pistol.
"It wasn't that distracting," Woods said. "I've been in races before where things happen for a variety of reasons and we have to get out of the blocks. The background and experience I've had in the past allowed me to shake it off and do my best in the race.
"This is a good set-up for my the final part of my collegiate career [in 2007]. I made a little noise this time, and hopefully everyone will look out for me next year and it'll be even better."
Woods scored three points for the 49ers' team total, putting them in 58th place out of 77 teams that scored points at the meet. She becomes the first women's competitor to score points at the Outdoor Championships for Charlotte. The previous-best women's national finish had been a seventh-place showing by Cassie Ficken at the 2005 Indoor Championships in the 5,000-meter run, when she became the first women's competitor to score at an NCAA indoor meet.
Shareese had qualified for the 2006 NCAA Outdoor meet by virtue of a second-place finish in the 200 dash at the NCAA East Regional Championships two weekends ago in Greensboro. There, she ran the nation's fourth-fastest qualifying time with a wind-aided 22.70 seconds. Woods was the Atlantic 10 Conference Champion in this event both indoors and outdoors, and led the team in scoring at both meets to lead Charlotte to a sweep of the league's women's team titles.
This is the second career All-American award for Woods, who won her first this winter with an 11th-place finish in the 400-meter dash at the NCAA Indoor Championships. She did not attempt to contest the 400 dash at this outdoor meet because the television schedule placed the 200 and 400 nearly back-to-back.
Woods is the second women's competitor in Charlotte history to earn more than one All-American award, but the first to do it solely in track & field. She joins three-time All-American Molly Kerin, who won two cross country All-American awards (1994, 1995) and one on the track (1995).
Woods was 12th in the 200-meter dash at the 2005 Outdoor Track & Field Championships, her first national-level meet at the time. She did not advance past the semifinal round last year.
Woods' sixth-place performance can be classified in a number of ways: tied as the best overall finish (men's or women's), best-ever women's finish, and best-ever women's outdoor showing.
Woods is the second competitor at these NCAA Championships to earn an All-American award, marking the first time Charlotte has ever won two All-America awards in the same gender in the same track & field season. Shareese missed out by just one spot when she finished 13th in the 100-meter dash, but teammate Courtney Patterson finished 11th in the same race and was the seventh U.S.-born finisher to earn her first All-American award on Thursday evening.
For his efforts in coaching Woods, Patterson and all the 49ers' sprinters, Charlotte associate head coach Tim Hall was named the East Region Outdoor Track Assistant Coach of the Year for sprints/hurdles. The honor was given to just four assistant coaches for sprints/hurdles throughout the entire country (one in each of the NCAA's four regions).
Robert Olesen, Charlotte's head coach, received his USTFCCCA Outdoor Track Southeast District Coach of the Year award on Saturday. The track coaches' association honored head coaches in each of the organization's nine districts.
The 49ers' season continues two weekends from now at the USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships in Indianapolis, Ind.
Charlotte 49ers Track & Field/Cross Country All-Americans
Listed chronologically
Molly Kerin, cross country (1994)
Molly Kerin, cross country (1995)
Molly Kerin, 5,000m (outdoor 1995)
Kenneth Svendsen, cross country (1999)
Kelly Travis, cross country (1999)
Rephel Martin, triple jump (outdoor 2000)
Will Montgomery, long jump (indoor 2001)
Will Montgomery, long jump (outdoor 2001)
Will Montgomery, long jump (outdoor 2002)
Sharonda Johnson, triple jump (outdoor 2004)
Cassie Ficken, 3,000m (indoor 2005)
Derrick Johnson, 60m (indoor 2005)
Shareese Woods, 400m (indoor 2006)
Courtney Patterson, 100m (outdoor 2006)
Shareese Woods, 200m (outdoor 2006)
