BYU secured three titles on the final day of the Big 12 Championships in Lubbock, Texas, finishing second overall with 110 points. The team was narrowly edged out by Texas Tech, which scored 114.5 points. This result marks BYU’s highest point total at the indoor championship since joining the Big 12 Conference. Oklahoma State placed third with 97 points.
The Cougars’ 4×400-meter relay team, consisting of Paje Rasmussen, Marianne Barber, Kali McEuen and Sami Oblad, won the conference title. Rasmussen opened with a split of 53.98 seconds, followed by Barber’s 52.45-second leg, which would have been a career best in an open 400 meters. McEuen ran third with a time of 53.86 seconds before Oblad anchored the team to victory with a strong finish in 51.13 seconds.
Jane Hedengren captured the title in the 3000 meters by nearly ten seconds and set a facility record with a time of 8:46.11. She finished her final lap in 32.38 seconds to secure her first conference title in this event.
Riley Chamberlain claimed her second Big 12 title by winning the 800 meters in 2:06.21 after taking the lead from Iowa State’s Makayla Clark at the 600-meter mark. Tessa Buswell finished third in that race with a time of 2:06.97, just three-thousandths of a second behind Clark.
Chamberlain also earned a runner-up finish in the 3000 meters with a time of 8:56.28 behind Oklahoma State’s Isca Chelangat, moving up seven places over the last half of the race.
In other results, Hedengren was second in the mile (4:24.33), while Zariel Macchia took fifth place (4:47.22). Rasmussen achieved personal bests and school records by finishing third in both the 200 meters (22.91) and the 60m dash (7.26). Oblad finished second in the 400 meters and extended her school record to 51.48; Barber completed that event in fourth place at 53.99.
Additional points came from Jacey Harkins-Farmer and Jenna Hutchins combining for five points in the 3000 meters, while Lexi Goff-Thompson earned three points for sixth place in the women’s thousand-meter run (2:46.17).
The NCAA will announce entries for its indoor National Championships on Tuesday, March 3, ahead of competition scheduled for March 13-14 at Randal Tyson Track Center in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
