INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. -- In a list released last week, ten Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference men’s track and field athletes were selected to compete at the 2023 NCAA Division III Track and Field Championships to be held on May 25-27 at the Polisseni Track & Field Complex at St. John Fisher University in Rochester, New York.
Texas Lutheran University will be represented by six athletes, followed by Trinity University with two. Colorado College and Southwestern University will each be sending one student-athlete to the championships to represent the SCAC.
For each individual event contested, including the decathlon and heptathlon, the top 22 declared student-athletes were accepted into the competition. For each relay event contested, the top 16 declared relay teams, one per institution, were accepted into the competition.
Texas Lutheran’s Elijah Jefferson will make his NCAA Outdoor Championship debut after qualifying in three different events. The two-time SCAC Champion in the 200-meters, qualified eighth in the event with a time of 21.05. The sophomore will also toe the line in the 100-meters, after qualifying 14th with a mark of 10.47.
Jefferson will be joined by teammates, first-year Weston Guzman, sophomore Wyatt Wilson and junior Bryce Powell-Chimene as the quartet will compete in the 4x100 relay. The SCAC Champions enter the NCAA Championships with the 13th best time in the nation at 40.91.
TLU’s Gerrit Twitero, the program record holder in both the indoor and outdoor high jump and a National Championship qualifier in the 2023 Indoor season, is set to compete in the high jump. The two-time defending SCAC Champions enters the Championships leading Division-III with a school record mark of 2.10m.
Rounding out the TLU contention heading to New York for a shot at a National Title is sophomore Ezra Acero. Acero, who won the pole vault at last month's SCAC Championship, is set to compete in the event after qualifying 15th in the nation with a vault of 4.91m.
Colorado College junior distance runner James Settles will make his debut appearance at the outdoor national championships.
Settles qualified for the 5,000-meter run with a school-record time of 14:08.47 at the Oxy Invitational earlier this month. He has the 17th-fastest time in the country for Division III entering the national meet. The SCAC Champion in the event is the first CC male to qualify for the outdoor championships in the 5K since Julian Boggs in 2007.
Southwestern University’s Jamal Maxey is headed to his first national championship meet after qualifying 20th in the long jump. The sophomore qualified after setting the Pirates’ program record of 7.28 meters back in April.
Trinity's Casey Hampton will join Maxey competiting in the long jump. The senior qulified 22nd with a leap of 7.22m.
The final SCAC athlete to compete at this year’s championships is Trinity sophomore Azariah Anderson. Anderson qualified fifth in the 110-meter hurdles with a time of 14.19. The Saint Charles, Mo. native is looking to become the first Tiger to earn All-American honors in a track event since Cody Hall finished second in the 110-meter hurdles in 2018.
The complete list of qualifiers is available HERE
