NSAF Meet of Champions Brings Together Top Fields From All Over The Country

By Doug Binder, DyeStat Editor

The NSAF USA Meet of Champions begins Thursday and will run through Sunday in Myrtle Beach, S.C. with a relatively small but power-packed startlist that includes representation from all over the country. 

Thursday's action begins with competition in the boys decathlon plus middle school and freshman sections on the track at Douglas Shaw Memorial Stadium. 

With entries numbering about 550 athletes, COVID-19 protocols are in place to ensure athlete safety in compliance with local health mandates. 

The championship sections comprise one of the most significant outdoor high school track meets in the U.S. since June of 2019 and represent the emerging comeback of the sport. The meet will be sanctioned by USATF, which means athletes will compete for clubs rather than school, or unattached.

WATCH THE NSAF USA MEET OF CHAMPIONS LIVE FRIDAY NIGHT THROUGH SUNDAY

Here are 10 Storylines to keep an eye out for this weekend at Myrtle Beach. 

1. Hobbs Kessler in the 2-mile. Kessler made headlines in early February when he broke the indoor high school boys mile record with 3:57.66 at the American Track League No. 3 meet at Randal Tyson Track Center in Fayetteville, Ark. 

Kessler now seeks a fast time outdoors in the 2-mile, where his official PR (9:51 for 3,200m) is nearly two years old. The senior from Ann Arbor, Michigan's Skyline High headlines a field that includes Alaska cross country champion Tristian Merchant, Indiana cross country champion Izaiah Steury, West Virginia cross country champion Larry Josh Edwards and Connecticut stars Gavin Sherry and Aidan Puffer. 

Another Texas standout, Ben Shearer from Woodlands Christian, ran 4:08.58 at the Texas Distance Festival last weekend. 

2. Gavin Schurr, Anthony Smith paired in sprints. Schurr will return to the East coast from Lafayette, Colo. with the intention of doubling in the 100 and 200 meters. Schurr ran a sensational 200 time of 20.84 indoors at the American Track League No. 4 meet in Fayetteville, Ark., finishing second to record-breaker Jaylen Slade of IMG Academy in Florida. 

Schurr previously raced twice at the Virginia Beach Sports Complex and ran a 6.73/21.28 double Dec. 5 at the Virginia Beach Opener. 

Smith, from Snoqualmie, Wash. (Eastside Catholic WA), has already acclimated to the Myrtle Beach climate and the Douglas Shaw Memorial Stadium track. Last weekend, Smith competed unattached in a small-college meet, the Alan Connie Shamrock Invitational, and won the 100 meters in 10.61 after running a wind-aided 10.49 in the prelims. He finished second in the 200 with 21.46.

3. Saratoga Springs (Kinetic) NY girls going for national 4x1 mile record: The girls who won the Nike Cross Nationals cross country championship in December of 2019 in Portland, Ore., have had scarce opportunities to compete as a team since then. 

At indoor meets this year, Kinetic TC lineups placed second in the Distance Medley Relay at the adidas Indoor Nationals and second in the 4x800 at the Ocean Breeze Elite Invitational. 

Six of the seven members of the 2019 cross country team will be part of 'A' and 'B' teams that will be hunting for the national record of 19:56.75 by Suffern NY in 2006. 

Ella Kurto and Emily Bush will team up with the Hart sisters — Mackenzie and Alycia — on the 'A' squad.

The Wheeler sisters, McKinley and Sheridan, are joined by Anya Belisle and Christina DeMeo on the 'B' team. 

Either side could put this record into play. 

4. Roisin Willis takes on the 400. One of the top half-milers in the country is looking to ramp up her speed and will join a fast lineup in the girls 400 meters. 

Willis competed indoors at the new Gately track in Chicago last weekend, but ran 15 meters too long due to an officials' error and still clocked 2:04.74 at the Cabin Fever Invitational. 

Willis owns a best of 53.74 in the 400 and did that last year in a virtual race. 

This weekend, she will be thoroughly tested. Caitlyn Bobb from Joppa, Md., ran 52.79 to place fourth at outdoor nationals in June of 2019. Philadelphia (Girard College PA) senior Margaret Conteh, the Pennsylvania state runner-up, and current US#2 Hali Murphy of Austin, Texas (St. Dominic Savio) are also entered. 

5. Peter Visser returns to the steeplechase. The last time the Star Valley WY standout ran in a steeplechase race, it was at the 2019 outdoor high school championships, where he placed a respectable 10th as a sophomore. 

Star Valley has serious history in the event. Shane Henderson won the national title in Greensboro, N.C. in 2017. 

Visser's credentials are every bit as good as Henderson's and a winning time under six minutes in the 2,000-meter event is within his reach. Henderson ran 5:54.77, which is the school record. 

Visser, who placed seventh in the XC Town USA Meet of Champions, is also entered in the mile, where he will face Sherry and Merchant.

6. Audrey DaDamio doubling in 5,000/Mile. One of the most notable "improvers" of the pandemic period, DaDamio's rise to elite status as one of the nation's best distance runners is firmly established by her winter PRs of 4:40.65 (1,600) and 9:51.28 (3,200). 

This weekend, DaDamio, who hails from Bloomfield Hills, Mich. (Birmingham Seaholm) will tackle an ambitious double. She'll race in her first 5,000 meters on the track Friday and then return Sunday for the mile. 

In both cases, she will have lots of high level competition. In the 5,000, Charlotte Bednar of Princeton, N.J. and Jenna Mulhern of West Chester, Pa., should be able to keep pace. 

At the Virginia Showcase in mid-January, DaDamio placed third in a fast 2-mile in 10:13.57, while Bednar was fifth (10:18.56) and Mulhern was sixth (10:19.83).

Additionally, the girls 2-mile is also loaded. Bednar will race fellow New Jersey standout Angelina Perez and from the west, Riley Stewart is coming from Colorado and Ella Borsheim is flying out from Washington. 

7. Patasha Bryan and Bryanna Craig in the heptathlon. The top two high school heptathletes will get their first chance to compete in the full multi. Bryan, of Santa Rosa Beach, Fla., and Craig, of Lubbock, Texas, will be part of a six-athlete field this weekend. 

Bryan has signed with Liberty University and Craig is a junior who won the outdoor high school nationals heptathlon as a freshman in 2019. 

Last August at the Jacksonville Athletic Club Combined Event Championships — one of the only events of its kind in all of 2020 — Bryan scored 5,010 points and Craig finished with 4,929. 

Shaina Zinter of White Bear Lake, Minn., a junior, also is one to watch. She was right behind Craig at the JAC Combined Event Championships, with 4,748 points. 

8. Collin Burkhart's unusual throws double. The senior from Nazareth, Pa., is entered in the javelin as well as the hammer this weekend. 

That's not a common double for a thrower, but Burkhart has had success in both events and also is a state qualifier (2019) in the discus.

Burkhart threw 203-8 in the javelin as a sophomore in 2019 at his district meet and went on to place second at the Pennsylvania state meet. 

He is coming out of a winter weight throw season where he finished US#5 at 72 feet, one-half inch. 

In the hammer, he owns a personal best of 176-1, but with his first opportunity to compete in the event since 2019, he could go far past that. 

9. Washington's Moll twins take on Paige Sommers in the pole vault. A pair of 14-foot vaulters from the West coast will go head to head this weekend.

Sommers, a Duke-bound senior from Westlake Village, Calif. successfully made 14-foot bars twice last year in vault-only meets in California, after setting the state and national junior class records with her 14-6 clearance last February at the Thousand Oaks Invitational.

She is the national outdoor leader this year at 14-3.25, achieved March 6 at the Vaulter Club Vaulter Magazine Grand Prix Spring event in Sun City, and followed it with another 14-foot clearance Wednesday in a Marmonte League dual meet against Moorpark. 

Tenth-grade sisters Amanda and Hana Moll from Olympia, Wash., (Capital High) scaled new heights during the winter. 

Amanda Moll cleared a US#1 indoor bar of 14 feet back on Dec. 1. Hana Moll cleared 13-6 at the same meet. 

Outdoors, Amanda made a lifetime best 14-3.75 on July 15 last summer to achieve the national freshman class record. Hana had a best of 13-1.50 last year, but has a pair of 13-6 indoor clearances this winter.

Allison Neiders, a teammate of the Moll sisters at Northwest Pole Vault Club who attends Holy Names Academy in Washington, achieved a personal-best 13-6.50 clearance March 6 and is scheduled to make the trip to South Carolina as well.   

10. Darius Kipyego in the 800. As a sophomore in 2019, Kipyego earned a silver medal for the U.S. in the Pan American U-20 Championships, running 1:49.46. 

The pandemic has stolen many of the usual opportunities to compete ever since, but the senior from Warwick, R.I., is ready to re-engage with the 800 meters and see what he can do.

Last summer, Kipyego ran a personal-best 1:48.82 in Connecticut and also ran sub-1:50 at the Music City Distance Carnival. 

This winter, he flashed some speed when the won the Rhode Island indoor state title in the 55-meter dash and placed second in the 600.  He also anchored two winning relays for St. Raphael High.