West and East Regional First Round fields announced by NCAA...

INDIANAPOLIS--The NCAA announced the field for both the West and East Division I first round which will be contested starting Wednesday May 28th through May 31st in Jacksonville, Florida (East), and College Station, Texas (West).

The University of Washington leads the way among the five Division I schools with 38 athletes (22 men/16 women) declared for the meet (numbers listed do not reflect athletes who are doubling).

Washington State has 25 athletes (15 men/10 women) declared, not counting athletes in both the men's and women's 4 x 100 relays not competing in individual events. 

Gonzaga has a group of four men and eight women going to College Station, while Eastern Washington's group consists of 110 hurdler Maddy Shekhewat and long/triple jumper Egypt Simmons.

For the tenth straight season, Seattle University failed to qualify a single athlete into the NCAA first round meet.

Athletes going into the West Regionals ranked number one in their events include Washington State's Evans Kurui (Paul Merca photo) in the 10000; Washington's Chloe Foerster, who did not compete in the Big Ten Championship meet last week, in the 1500; and, of course, the Huskies' collegiate record holder in the pole vault, Amanda Moll.

Those declared to double in the meet besides Eastern Washington's Egypt Simmons include: Washington's Amina Maatoug (1500/5000), Kaia Tupu-South (shot/discus); Evan Jenkins and Jamar Distel (5000/10000); Washington State's Brooke Lyons (100/200); Mason Lawyer (100/200); and Evans Kurui (5000/10000). Lyons and Lawyer are also listed on WSU's 4 x 100 relay teams.

Washington's Sofia Cosculluela advanced directly to the NCAA finals in Eugene in the heptathlon by virtue of her 5817 score at the Mt. SAC Relays last month, which is ranked number 7 nationally. 

Also advancing to nationals directly in the heptathlon is Tahoma HS grad Alaina Brady of Notre Dame, who has the number 9 score of 5751 points, set when she finished second in the ACC championships last week.

UW'S SIMON PARK OUT OF REGIONALS DUE TO EQUIPMENT ERROR AT BIG TENS...

One of the victims of last week's Big Ten men's pole vault fiasco was Washington's Simon Park (Paul Merca photo).

Park cleared what would have been a outdoor season best mark of 17-0.25 (5.19m), two centimeters above the number 48 mark on the NCAA West Region descending order list after accounting for scratches, which was 5.17m or 16-11.5.

At the Big Ten meet, the standards had the high school approved 75 millimeter pegs used to hold the crossbar instead of the international 55 millimeter pegs.

Meet officials did not discover that the pegs were the high school regulation and not the international regulation ones until after the fact.

While the results and the placings stood, all competitors were credited with a no height mark because of the use of the high school pegs.

Both the UW and the Big Ten filed an appeal on behalf of the field to validate the marks from the meet, but were denied.

NOTABLES WITH WASHINGTON TIES AT THE NCAA REGIONALS...

While not a complete list, here are some of the notables with Washington ties competing at the two NCAA regional meets next week:

In the West, Jonas Price (Yakima) from Portland is in the men's 1500, while Jacob Andrews (Bellingham) of USC is in the men's 400.

Montana State's Rob McManus of Cashmere is in the men's steeplechase, along with Walla Walla's Dash Sirmon of Nebraska in the men's javelin. Ridgefield's Trey Knight of Cal State Northridge is one of the top seeds in the men's hammer.

In the East region, Seattle's Will Floyd of Georgia is in the men's 400, along with Bellingham's Andre Korbmacher of Florida State in the 110 hurdles. Eastern Washington grad transfer Ryan Rieckmann of Cincinnati will compete in the javelin.

On the women's side, Carnation's Braelyn Baker of Duke goes in the 400 hurdles, while teammate Allison Neiders of Seattle is entered in the pole vault.

In all events, the top 12 will advance to the NCAA championship finals in Eugene May 11-14th.

The NCAA release is available here.

NOTE: The NCAA, and the sports information offices of Washington, Washington State, Eastern Washington, and Gonzaga contributed to this report.

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