6 midseason superlatives for the 2025 DI outdoor track and field season | NCAA.com

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Stan Becton | NCAA.com | April 15, 2025

6 midseason superlatives for the 2025 DI outdoor track and field season

Men's 4x400m final - 2024 NCAA track and field championships

We're at the midpoint in men's and women's outdoor track and field, and the season is red hot with championships rapidly approaching.

Let's hand out midseason superlatives for the outdoor season to some of the nation's top performers in 2025.

Best record-breaking performance

Cal’s Mykolas Alekna became the first man ever to throw a discus 75 meters in WORLD HISTORY at the Oklahoma Throws Series World Invitational. Alekna launched the discus 75.56 meters on his fourth throw of the competition.

If his 75 meter throw wasn’t enough, he threw 74.89 meters on his first throw of the day to break his previous world record. Overall, the day was what some called “The greatest discus competition ever.”

RECORDS: Every track and field record broken in 2025

Lived-up-to-the-hype award

Auhmad Robinson saw another individual NCAA championship evade him at indoors this winter. It’s another chip on the shoulders of one of the top quarter-milers in the NCAA across the last few seasons. 

How did he respond in the outdoor season?

Robinson became the first collegian to break 45 seconds this outdoor season at Florida Relays with a blazing 44.61 second finish. He finished over half a second (a lot in track) faster than the rest of the field. 

It’s safe to say Robinson will remain one of the top contenders in the 400 meters all season long.

ICYMI: An early-season recap for DI track and field

Under-the-radar award

Duke’s Lauren Tolbert ran 51.83 in the 400 meters and 2:01.87 in the 800 meters at the Duke Invitational for a pair of season bests and in the 400, a personal best. That makes Tolbert the only woman in the country with a top-10 mark in the 400 and 800 meters this season. She’s a big reason as to why the Blue Devils were No. 13 in the latest rankings.

🏃 MORE COLLEGE TRACK & FIELD 🏃

Best sophomore leap 

Akala Garrett finished 2024 with a fourth-place finish in the 400 hurdles as a freshman, but her growth in the 100 hurdles has positioned her as one of the top all-around hurdlers in the country.

Garrett’s fastest 100 hurdles time was 13.23 seconds as a freshman, ranking 53rd nationally and scratching from NCAA first round competition. This year, the Longhorn sophomore has run a windy 12.75 (+2.6) — that’s the second-fastest all-conditions time and a wind-legal 13.09 that’s the eight-fastest such time in the country.

Garrett has still found success in the 400 hurdles this spring, too, running a season’s best 55.49 seconds at Texas Relays. If she keeps it up in both the 100 and 400 hurdles, she’ll be on track to follow Olympians Jasmine Jones (2024), Masai Russell (2021-23) and Anna Cockrell (2019, 2021) as recent finalists at NCAA championships in both hurdle events.

Rookie of the year

There’s plenty of candidates for rookie of the year at the midpoint of the track and field season, but the pick right now has to be New Mexico’s Pamela Kosgei. She has two No. 2 all-time marks in the 10,000 meters (31:02.73) and steeplechase (9:15.93). Kosgei is performing at a historic level in her first year on the track collegiately.

AWARDS: The 2025 Bowerman Watch List for men's and women's NCAA track and field

Best unit

The Southern California men’s sprints group is the best unit halfway through the outdoor season. The Trojans are fresh off of an indoor championship and haven’t missed a beat. 

To start, USC has run the fastest and third-fastest 4x100 meter relays this year. Garrett Kaalund leads the nation with his 20.05 second 200 meter finish at LSU’s Battle on the Bayou. Yougendy Mauricette sits eighth nationally with a 50.35 second finish in the 400 hurdles. Yet, it was a recent performance at the Texas A&M 44 Farms Team Invitational that locked up the best unit spot for the Trojans.

USC swept the top five in the 100 meters at the meet led by Max Thomas, Garrett Kaalund and Eddie Nketia, with all running sub-10 seconds (+2.4). Those three sprinters now occupy the second through fourth spots nationally on the all-conditions 100 meters chart. Sprinter Travis Williams ranks 10th, while JC Stevenson and Taylor Banks find themselves in the top 18. Moreover, William Jones ran the nation’s second-fastest 400 meters at the same meet, finishing in 45.09 seconds.

The depth USC showcased in the sprints during the indoor season has only gotten better outdoors.

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