By Collin Catman
Friday marked the last day of men’s competition in the NCAA Track and Field Championships. It also marked the last day Sam Prakel wore a University of Oregon singlet.
The distance runner closed his accomplished career at the UO with a sixth-place finish in the 1,500 meters, a race as physical and tactical as it gets.
So physical that Prakel’s teammate, walk-on Mick Stanovsek, stumbled on the first 150 of the race. It was a stumble that he simply could not recover from.
“Got jarred up in that first 150 and kinda hard to shake that off,” Stanovsek said. “You can chalk it up to inexperience or just no one being able to run well in that sort of field. Obviously massive disappointment.”
Prakel finished in 3 minutes, 45.73 seconds, about a second behind winner Ollie Hoare of Wisconsin, who won in 3:44.77. Stanovsek finished 12th in 3:56.12, well off the pace.
But the redshirt sophomore has much to be proud of. After being left off the Oregon cross country team in 2015-16, Stanovsek has been improving every year. Last outdoor season Stanovsek made it all the way to the NCAA West Regionals in the 1,500, and this year he made it all the way to the NCAA finals.
Oregon will need this continued improvement from Stanovsek, as Prakel ran his last race in the green and yellow.
A four-time All-American and Pac-12 champion in the 1,500, Prakel leaves the UO accomplished both on and off the track. He was a six-time first-team Pac-12 All-Academic team member, four times in cross country and two times in track.
The physicality of the race was rare, forcing all of the runners to change their tactics. Prior to the race, New Mexico junior Josh Kerr proclaimed he was going for the collegiate record, but he finished third. No one was safe in the wet and competitive conditions at Hayward.
Though the end result may not have been what he wanted, Prakel was able to identify areas of his game that he needs to work on, specifically against the top runners in the United States.
“The whole season I’ve been confident in my moves,” he said. “Maybe racing against guys like (Kerr) I changed things up a little too much today. A race like this keeps me hungry, and I’ll be back for sure.”
Not only was this Prakel’s last time running for the Ducks, but it was also his last time running at Hayward Field.
“It’s not a bad way to go out, you know — I got to run in front of an incredible crowd one last time,” he said. “I’m sure all the emotions will hit me in a bit once I realize this is the last time I will be wearing the Oregon uniform and running at historic Hayward Field.”
Prakel will only have so much time to think about his collegiate career, as he will be running in professionally quite soon.
“I’ll be running USAs in a couple weeks and then continuing to run professionally and aiming for the 2020 (Olympic) trials,” he said. “I think I’m pretty well set up for that.”
