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Oregon’s men are in first place after the first day of the NCAA Track & Field Championships at Historic Hayward Field in Eugene Thursday. There was no way junior Edward Cheserek could outperform the form chart, but he still managed to put on a show. Cheserek won his third straight 10,000-meter title, in 29 minutes, 9.57 seconds, leading the last kilometer and gapping the competition in the final 200 for his 14th NCAA title, one shy of the national record. The Ducks also got a second consecutive third-place finish from senior Greg Skipper, the only man to score in the event the last four years in a row. They added points in two other field events, with Cody Danielson taking seventh in the javelin and Cole Walsh tying for seventh in the pole vault. Oregon’s 19 points are three more than second-place Arkansas, and eight more than third-place Purdue. LSU positioned itself to pick up big points in the sprints finals Friday, but the nation’s top-ranked team entering the meet, Texas A&M, dropped the baton in the 4×100 and didn’t get a point from any of its three pole vaulters, signifiant setbacks.
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Oregon pitcher Cheridan Hawkins has been named the Pac-12 Softball Scholar-Athlete of the Year, the conference announced Wednesday. A scholar-athlete of the year is named in each of the Pac-12’s 23 sponsored sports. Hawkins is the first Oregon student-athlete to earn a Pac-12 scholar-athlete of the year award this academic year and the first from the Oregon softball program to win it. She is the first from Oregon to earn the award since Laura Roesler won for women’s track and field in 2013-14. Hawkins, who as a senior in 2016 was named both an All-American for the third straight season and an Academic All-American for the third straight year, owns a 3.82 GPA in family and human services while also leading the Pac-12 with a 1.77 ERA, .168 opponent batting average and 257 strikeouts. She was second in the conference with 24 wins.
Contract Extension for Tinkle
Oregon State men’s basketball head coach Wayne Tinkle received a two-year contract extension that takes him through the 2021-22 season, Vice President/Director of Athletics Todd Stansbury announced Tuesday. In his first two seasons, Tinkle won 36 games, including upsets over two Top 25 teams, and led the Beavers to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1990. He became the second Oregon State coach in history to win 17-plus games in each of his first two seasons (Bob Hager, 1923-24).