PORTLAND, Ore – Lizzy Daugherty aimed for the sky.
 
And she got there in high-flying fashion.
 
The Seattle Pacific sophomore pole vaulter bettered her outdoor personal-best mark three times and her overall personal best twice on Saturday morning, clearing 12 feet, 4 inches at the Linfield Open track and field meet.
 
That tied her with Ally Studer (2003) for the third-highest mark in school history. It also is tied for No. 8 in Great Northwest Athletic Conference history.
 
 

Coming into the day, Daughery's best-ever mark was 11-7, and that came indoors on Feb. 22 at the Great Northwest Athletic Conference Championships in Spokane. Her outdoor best was 11-2¼ on April 9 at the PLU Invitational in Tacoma.
 
"I was really excited. It still doesn't feel real to me, and it has been hours since it happened," Daugherty said. "In practice, I've been clearing those heights. But I get to a meet, and the bar goes up, and something changes in my head. I got past that a little more today and got jumps that were like practice jumps."
 
Daugherty passed her outdoor mark with a first-attempt clearance of 11-6¼. That was personal best No. 1.
 
From there, the bar was raised to 12 feet even. She missed on her first two, but got over on her last try. Now, she had another outdoor PB as well as an overall PB, leaving behind that old mark of 11-7.
 
Then it was up to 12-4. Again, Daugherty missed on the first two, but saved her best for last, getting over on the third one.
 
Daugherty's only tweak she made before taking that last attempt was to adjust her line of sight
 
"It was just reminding myself not to look at the bar, but to look for the sky and shoot for that," she said.
 
Add it all up, and she was a whopping 13¾ inches higher than what her outdoor personal best had been to start the day, and seven inches above her overall PB.
 
Her final mark put her onto the NCAA Division II provisional qualifying list, beating the 12-3½ minimum standard. What's more, she did it in conditions that were far from ideal.
 
"We started out with some rain, which made me nervous, then we had some big gusts of wind going the whole time," she said
 
At 12-4, Daugherty is now tied for the GNAC lead with Northwest Nazarene's Kinsey Yenor, with NNU"s Julie Cheney just half an inch behind them. All three of them will be among the contenders for the crown at next week's GNAC meet in Ellensburg.
 
Daugherty said having to battle the wind on Saturday could be helpful for conference competition.
 
"Central is notorious for being super windy, but I got past that today and jumped well," she said. "That gives me confidence that I can do that again next week."
 




ARCHER SPEEDS UP SPU'S ALL-TIME LIST
It wasn't that long ago when Isaiah Archer just wanted to break 50 seconds in the 400-meter dash.
 
Now, he's coming close to breaking 49.
 
Going stride-for-stride down the homestretch with unattached Sam Baricevic, Archer out-leaned him for a final time of 49.17 seconds and the victory at the Portland Twilight.
 
Archer's time on the track at Griswold Stadium on the Lewis & Clark College campus ranks as the sixth-fastest in SPU history. It also was his personal best by 41 hundredths of a second, beating the 49.58 he clocked on April 9 at the PLU Open in Tacoma.
 
Coming down the homestretch, Baricevic edged ahead of Archer. They both stretched forward at the finish line, but it was not readily apparent who actually won. At first, the scoreboard showed Archer, then changed to Baricevic, then it finally went back to Archer and stayed there.
 
AND THAT'S NOT ALL
-- Aniya Green posted a personal-best time of 58.88 seconds in the women's 400-meter dash. That was nearly a full second faster than her previous best of 59.70 from April 1 at the West Coast Relays in Clovis, California.
-- Nicki Yorges took a four-second drop in the women's 1500 meters, stopping the watch in 4:48.25. Her previous best was 4:52.15 on March 26 at the Peyton-Shotwell Invitational in Tacoma. Yorges is now nine second better than her collegiate 1500 debut time of 4:57.40 on March 12 at the PLU Open.
-- The men's 4-by-100 relay of David Njeri, Jeff Gordon, Julius Shepherd, and Darius Holmes recorded a season-best time of 43.17 seconds. It was their second time together in that same order and was nearly half a second faster than the 43.65 they posted on April 9 at the PLU Invitational.
-- Brad Bowman went a season-best 14 feet, 1 ¾ inches for second place in the pole vault at the Linfield Open. That was exactly one foot higher than his previous season best.
 
UP NEXT
The GNAC Championships are set for this coming Friday and Saturday, May 13 and 14, at the Central Washington Recreation Sports Complex in Ellensburg.
 
Competition on Friday begins at 11:00 a.m. in the field with the men's javelin and women's long jump, and at 3:30 p.m. on the track with the women's 3000-meter steeplechase. The last event of the day is the men's 10,000 meters at 7:30 p.m.
 
On Saturday the 14th, field events start at 10:30 a.m. with the men's triple jump. The first track event is the women's 4-by-100 relay at 2:45 p.m., and the last one is the men's 4-by-400 relay at 5:45. Team and individual awards are schedule for 6:00 p.m.

 
NCAA WOMEN'S TRACK & FIELD
Portland Twilight
Saturday, May 7, 2022
Griswold Stadium / Portland, Ore.
 
Team scores – Not kept.
 
SPU EVENTS ONLY
100 – 1, Peace Igbonagwam (SPU) 12.31.  No other SPU.
400 – 1, Grace Conrad  (Trinity Western) 54.47.  SPU – 2, Vanessa Aniteye 55.83!; 4, Jenna Bouyer 56.15!; 8, Aniya Green 58.88.
800 – 1, Laura Pellicoro (Portland) 2:04.08.  SPU – 9, Ellie Rising 2:15.44.
1500 – 1, Yazmine Wright (Unattached) 4:16.18.  SPU – 23, Annika Esvelt 4:41.92; 29, Nicki Yorges 4:48.25.
4x100 relay – 1, Simon Fraser 47.27.  SPU – Seattle Pacific DQ.
400 hurdles – 1, Gabrielle Mace (U. San Francisco) 1:00.71.  SPU – 4,  Johanna Brown 1:09.57; 5, McKenzie Fletcher 1:10.64.
 
 
Linfield Open
Saturday, May 7, 2022
Linfield University Track / McMinnville, Ore.
 
Team scores – Not kept.
 
SPU EVENTS ONLY
Pole vault – 1, Lizzy Daugherty (SPU) 12-4 / 3.76m#!.  Other SPU – T2, Charlie Hill and Madison Licari 11-0¼ / 3.36m!; T11, Emily Northey 9-6½ / 2.91m.
 
# NCAA provisional qualifying
!  GNAC automatic qualifying.
 
 
NCAA MEN'S TRACK & FIELD
Portland Twilight
Saturday, May 7, 2022
Griswold Stadium / Portland, Ore.
 
Team scores – Not kept.
 
SPU EVENTS ONLY
100 – 1, Solo Hines (Whitworth) 11.15.  SPU – 7, David Njeri 11.35; 9, Jeff Gordon 11.44; 13, Darius Holmes 11.82.
400 – 1, Isaiah Archer (SPU) 49.17.  Other SPU – 3, Evan Carpenter 50.52.
800 – 1, Reece Sharman-Newell (Colo. St.-Pueblo) 1:48.77#. SPU – 27, Jon Owen 1:59.13; 36, Drew Thompson 2:02.63.
1500 – 1, Robert J. Heppenstall (Unattached) 3:40.71.  SPU – 47, Ben Sheirbon 4:07.60; 54, Colin Boutin 4:10.73; 64, Brennan LeBlanc 4:17.02; 65, Gabe Endresen 4:18.09.
4x100 relay – 1, Eastern Oregon 42.03.  SPU – 2, Seattle Pacific (David Njeri, Jeff Gordon, Julius Shepherd, Darius Holmes) 43.17.
400 hurdles – 1, Jorrin Lenton (Simon Fraser) 54.78!.  SPU – 2, Julius Shepherd 58.36.
 
 
Linfield Open
Saturday, May 7, 2022
Linfield University Track / McMinnville, Ore.
 
Team scores – Not kept.
 
SPU EVENTS ONLY
Pole vault – 1, Darrian Walker (E. Oregon) 15-7 ¼ / 4.76m.  SPU – T2, Brad Bowman 14-1¾ / 4.31m; Kainoa Lee no height.