NCAA undercover championship meets begin Friday in Fayetteville, Birmingham, and Winston-Salem...

For the few athletes from the University of Washington, Seattle Pacific, Western Washington, Central Washington, and Saint Martin’s fortunate enough to qualify, this weekend is championship weekend, as the NCAA indoor track & field championships take place in Fayetteville, Arkansas (Division I) and Birmingham, Alabama (Division II) beginning on Friday.

Washington, which was the only in-state Division I school to qualify athletes for the meet, will have twelve athletes in the meet, making them the third largest Pac-12 squad.

Friday, the Huskies will send out Eleanor Fulton (left/photo by Paul Merca) in the women’s mile semifinals at 6 pm Central (4 pm Pacific).  At the same time, MPSF champ Jax Thoirs and teammate Lev Marcus begin competition in the men’s pole vault.

Fifteen minutes later, Izaic Yorks goes for the Huskies in the men’s mile semis. At 8:45 pm, MPSF 5000m champ Aaron Nelson goes in his specialty, followed 20 minutes later by the finals of the women’s distance medley relay, with Fulton, Gianna Woodruff, Baylee Mires, and Maddie Meyers (Joelle Amaral is the relay alternate) expected to line up for the Dawgs.

At 7:25pm central time, Federal Way native Hannah Cunliffe, the Big 12 freshman of the year from Oklahoma goes in the semis of the women’s 60 dash, with the top two finishers, plus the four fastest times from the two semis advancing to Saturday’s final.  Tacoma native Marcus Chambers is expected to run the 400 leg for Oregon’s distance medley relay team, which is heavily favored to win the national title in that event.  Tansey Lystad of Kirkland, who competes for the University of Portland is in the women's 5000.

Saturday, two time MPSF champ Kristina Owsinski and defending Pac-12 champ Diamara Planell Cruz will go in the finals of the women’s pole vault at 5:30pm central (3:30pm pacific). Assuming they get out of Friday’s semifinal rounds, Fulton and Yorks will run in the finals of the mile at 6:00pm and 6:10pm.

Maddie Meyers will run in the finals of the women’s 3000 at 8:00pm, with Colby Gilbert running the men’s 3000 final fifteen minutes later.  Assuming she survives the qualifying on Friday, Cunliffe will run the finals of the women’s 60 at 7:00pm.

Seattle native Darian Brooks of Stanford competes in the finals of the men’s triple jump at 6 pm.

ESPN3 will live stream the NCAA indoor track & field championship meet starting at 4pm both days, with a tape delay of the championship airing at 4 pm pacific time on March 23rd.

The University of Washington’s release is available here. The link to live stats of the meet is available here.

In Birmingham, Alabama, Seattle Pacific, Western Washington, Central Washington, and Saint Martin’s will all send representatives to compete at the NCAA Dvision II meet in Birmingham, Alabama.

The Falcons’ Lynelle Decker will run in the qualifying round of the 800 meters at 3:30pm pacific, and run in the finals of the distance medley relay two hours later, along with Jessica Rawlins, Becca Houk and Anna Patti.

Also competing on Friday are Saint Martin’s Mikel Smith in the high jump, Western Washington’s Alex Donigian in the men’s 60, and teammate Katelyn Steen in the women’s 5000.

Saturday, Donigian competes in the men’s 60 finals, and Decker goes in the women’s 800 assuming they advance out of Friday’s semis.  Steen will run in the finals of the 3000, while Central Washington’s Tayler Fettig (high jump) and Luke Plummer (triple jump) go in their events.

NCAA.com will have live streaming of the Division II championships each day starting at 11am, pacific.  The link to live stats is available here.

Don’t usually mention Division III much here on the blog, but Puget Sound’s Allanah Whitehall is entered in the 60 meter dash, where she is the current national leader in the event at 7.56.

Roosevelt HS graduate Lucy Cheadle of Washington University in St. Louis will run both the 5000 and the 3000 the following day.  Cheadle is ranked #6 in the 3000, and #3 in the 5000.

The Division III championships are being contested Friday & Saturday in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

The link to live results is available here.  NCAA.com will offer live streaming coverage of the meet.