Minnesota is bringing home four individual event Big Ten Championships
The Minnesota Golden Gophers men’s track and field team know they had a good chance to make some nose at the Big Ten Championships held last weekend in Eugene, Oregon, and they did just that. The Gopher men finished in second place overall just behind the host Oregon Ducks as a team and took home three individual event Big Ten Championships. The Gopher women would finish in seventh place at a team and also brought home one individual crown to Minneapolis.
The Gophers got off to a blistering start right away in the field day of the competition on Friday. Minnesota’s #1 nationally ranked hammer throw squad did not disappoint. Fifth-year senior Kostas Zaltos capped off his final Big Ten Championship by throwing a Big Ten Championships meet record 77.67m (254-10) to win his fourth career Big Ten Hammer Championship! Zaltos would be honored by the Big Ten as the Men’s Field Athlete of the Championships. Zaltos is the first Gopher to earn the outdoor Big Ten Field Athlete of the Championships since 2009 when Aaron Studt was honored.
His fellow Greek national and Gopher teammate Angelos Mantzouranis finished right behind in second place with a throw of 75.11m (246-5). Isaiah Schafer throw a lifetime best throw of 66.57m (218-5) to place in seventh place and give the Gopher team a whopping 20 points for the event handing them an early lead.
On Saturday Minnesota sophomore Charles Godfred went back to back in the long jump. He would defend his Big Ten crown in a leap of 8.05m (26-5). Godfred became the first man to defend his conference long jump crown since 2014 and was just eight centimeters short of Jesse Owens’ championship meet record of 8.13m that was set back in 1935.
The third men’s individual championship came in the 4×100 meter relay. Minnesota came in with the second best time in the conference behind USC but the group of Zion Campbell, Kion Benjamin, Aaron Charles and Devin Augustine would go out in a time of 38.54 to break their own Big Ten Championships meet record that was set in 2023 (38.87) an take home the top spot.
Besides Mantzouranis the Gopher men would add another pair of second place finishes. Jak Urlacher would not be able to repeat his Pole Vault title from 2024 but he would jump 5.59m (18-4) and finish in second place. Sophomore Ahmed Khadar would run back to back lifetime bests in the prelims and the finals of the 400 meter hurdles and would finish in second place with a time of 50.49 seconds on Sunday. It was the fastest time in that event by a Gopher man in 21 years (Mikael Jakobsson, 49.72 – 2004).
Augustine would add a third place finish for the Gophers in the 200 meters with a time of 20.47 to tie his season best as well.
The women would finish in 7th place and be led by hammer thrower Anthonett Nabwe. She would win the women’s Hammer throw and set a Big Ten Championships meet record with a lifetime best 69.85m (229-2) which also goes down as a new Minnesota school record. Nabwe was joined on the podium by Hadley Streit who came in fourth with a personal best hammer throw of 65.65m (215-4).
Nabwe would return on Saturday and finish in second place in the discus throw as well.. with a distance of 55.36m. The final medal for the Gophers was a third place finish in the women’s 3000m steeplechase. True freshman Isabelle Schmitz ran the race in 9:57.56 finish in third place and earn a spot on the Big Ten’s All-Freshmen team as the highest placing freshman finisher in the event.
Minnesota now heads to the 2025 NCAA West Regional from May 28-31 in Bryan-College Station, Texas, at Texas A&M. Minnesota will look to have their athletes finish in the Top 12 in each event at the West Regionals and earn a berth to the NCAA Championships held back in Eugene from June 11-14.