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NCAA Championships Men's Preview and Final Rankings
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Unlike the women's competition, there are few big changes in my men's final rankigns. Results were all over the place at regionals, but the top throwers all moved through with the exception of Conor McCullough (Princeton) who did not compete at regionals. This competition is almost two close to call. A case can be made for all of the top four to win the meet. Marcel Lomnicky (Virginia Tech) is the defending champion, has a history of peaking well, and has the best mark in the NCAA this year. Walter Henning (LSU) won the indoor title in March and has been the most consistent thrower this spring. Steffen Nerdal (Memphis) recently broke 72-meters for the first time and has a tendancy to throw personal bests at past NCAA meets. And, while I started to write off Alexander Ziegler (Virginia Tech) last week, he proved me wrong and showed he is returning to form after all by winning the East Regional and beating all the other favorites with a season best throw of 71.35m. The only favorite that improved his case at regionals was Ziegler; the rest just turned in so-so performances that are hard to draw any conclusions from. As a result, I'm leaving my predictions relativly unchanged in this edition, with the exception of Ziegler moving up a few spots. After the top four, the field is wide open. More than a dozen throwers sit between 65 and 68 meters. Some have been consistent, others haven't and we always give the edge to those that are consistent. When it comes down to championship time, it's more likely that the consistent thrower will continue to be consistent. While big personal bests and fluke throws always happen, we're thinking that the consistency shown by some of the West region qualifiers will put them in the top eight.
Dropped from rankings: Conor McCullough (Princeton) (4); Branislav Danis (Georgia) (8). Men Hammer Throw Offical Entries ============================================================= Name Year School Seed SB ============================================================= 1 Alexander Ziegler FR VA Tech 71.35m 71.35m 2 Steffen Nerdal SR Memphis 68.23m 72.04m 3 Walter Henning JR LSU 67.72m 72.98m 4 Marcel Lomnicky SO VA Tech 67.55m 74.83m 5 Jason Lewis SR Az State 66.31m 67.07m 6 Trey Henderson JR USC 66.13m 67.63m 7 Dimitrios Fylladitakis JR UTEP 65.78m 68.82m 8 Adonson Shallow SR SE Louisiana 65.76m 67.07m 9 James Rogan SR Idaho 65.52m 67.55m 10 Zack Midles SR Washington 64.81m 64.81m 11 Michael Lauro SO LSU 64.48m 66.36m 12 Oliver Whaley JR BYU 64.09m 64.09m 13 KP Singh JR Oklahoma 63.87m 65.69m 14 Jordan Stray JR Oregon 63.79m 66.36m 15 Brad Millar SR DePaul 63.73m 66.13m 16 Branislav Danis SR Georgia 63.53m 68.25m 17 Timothy Morse SR Radford 63.30m 65.70m 18 J.C. Lambert SO S. Illinois 63.22m 63.23m 19 Mike Zajac JR S. Carolina 63.14m 64.31m 20 Matej Muza SR VA Tech 62.56m 65.68m 21 Matthew Gac SR Buffalo 61.99m 61.99m 22 Beau Whitney SR Idaho 61.84m 62.52m 23 Zach Berg SR Clemson 61.65m 64.19m 24 Hans Eriksson SR UTEP 61.61m 63.23m The CollegeHammer.com rankings are subjective and take into account the following factors: head-to-head record versus top rivals, season's best, previous big meet performances (i.e. peaking ability), recent performances, consistency, personal best, as well as other factors. CollegeHammer.com is a published by the non-profit Evergreen Athletic Fund and edited by Martin Bingisser. Please consider donating to help support the site. |