The Fab Five: Wildcats Eye NCAA Track & Field Prelims

They are this year's Fab Five.

Grad student Alyssa Colbert and freshman Elizabeth Martell, grad student Nicolas Sevilla-Connelly, senior James Wilkes and junior Nate Hobbs, come on down.

The five are the members of the University of New Hampshire outdoor track & field team who qualified for the NCAA Division I Outdoor Track & Field East Prelims to be held at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville from Wednesday through Saturday.

Colbert will throw the discus, Martell will compete in the 800-meter run, Sevilla-Connelly will run the 3,000-meter steeplechase, Wilkes the 800 and Hobbs will do the long jump.

There will be 48 competitors in each event and the ultimate goal is to qualify for the NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships to be held June 9-12 at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore. Only 12 individuals in each event – from both Jacksonville and the West Prelims in College Station, Tex., - will qualify for the Championships.

"It's nice to have both programs, the men and the women, get two or three kids there," said Jim Boulanger, the director of UNH's cross country and track & field programs who is retiring after this season after nearly 40 years of leading the programs. "It's a tribute to the kids we have here who have worked hard to get there."

Colbert, Martell and Hobbs broke school records on their way to the NCAAs this season – for Colbert and Hobbs it was a matter of breaking their own records they had set in previous seasons – and Sevilla-Connelly and Wilkes made major jumps in their personal best times in the steeplechase and 800 meters.

Now, they'll see what they can do on the NCAA stage.

Alyssa Colbert, Smithfield, R.I.

Colbert was recruited out of high school to play soccer and was primarily a javelin thrower when she got to UNH.

She tweaked her elbow with the javelin and was having some soreness in it and began to focus more on the discus and hammer. In the discus especially, she kept getting better and better.

Colbert broke the school record with a throw of 148 feet, 1 inch in the first outdoors meet of the 2019 season.

This year, she broke her own school mark on a regular basis until establishing a new standard of 169 feet, 2 inches to win the America East Conference discus title at the beginning of this month.

"That 21-foot jump to 169 is just incredible improvement," said Robert Hoppler, the co-head coach of the women's track & field team. "It speaks to her athleticism to have the success she had to be recruited as a soccer player, have success as a javelin thrower and then success with the hammer and as a school record holder in the discus. Her ability to adapt to different events with different skill sets is very impressive."

Then there's her work ethic.

Colbert was named the female winner of UNH's Tina True Award for her work in the weight room.

"That speaks volumes," Hoppler said. "Of all the women athletes at UNH she stood out as the one who was the most dedicated to being great in the weight room."

Colbert is seeded No. 36 and competes Saturday at 1:30 p.m.

Elizabeth Martell, Essex Junction, Vermont

Martell had a very nice America East Conference meet, but was on the outside looking in at the NCAA as of the end of the league championships. She finished third in the 800 in a personal best time of 2 minutes, 7.96 seconds in the conference meet and was on the winning 4x800-meter relay team.

She was going to need a faster time to qualify for the NCAA East Prelims.

Martell went out and got it – a 2:05.59 for second place - with an impressive performance at the IC4A/ECAC championships. In the process, she broke the school record of 2:06.63, set by current Olympics hopeful Elinor Purrier in 2016.

"For a first-year student, one of the things that has impressed me most with Lizzie as an athlete is her composure and her mental approach to both training and racing," Hoppler said. "She really rose to the occasion and had a fantastic race at IC4As."

The attitude going into the race was that she had nothing to lose, the coach said.

"The approach we took was that she was a freshman and even before that meet she had achieved an incredible amount," Hoppler said. "It was, 'You've had a great season and you're in fantastic shape, so go for it.'"

She went out fast, but not too aggressively, and finished second in the race.

Martell competes in the first round of the 800 on Thursday at 7:50 p.m. and will attempt to advance to Saturday's quarterfinals. She is seeded 27th.

Nicolas Sevilla-Connelly, Chester, N.H.

Sevilla-Connelly is another of the Wildcats who had a standout season, setting personal bests in the 1500 meters (3:52.58) and mile (4:07.87) as well as the 3000-meter steeplechase (8:49.85).

The steeplechase mark came as he won the America East title in the event May 1.

Boulanger figures he may have to slice about seven seconds off his best time to advance to the NCAA Championships. That's about the same result Sevilla-Connelly would need to catch the school record of 8:42.20, set by John Prizzi in 2014.

"He's capable of doing it," Boulanger said. "It's what you do in the race that day, how you handle the heat, how everything goes. It's all about race day. Can you ride the group and finish high enough?"

Sevilla-Connelly had a successful 2019 cross country season and built off that this year.

He and Colbert opted to return to UNH and compete as graduate students and have taken advantage of their extra year.

"Nico made a late decision to come back to school and trained hard and all he had to do was race this spring," Boulanger said. "I think one key is kids aren't tired coming off an indoor season. . . . Nico's had a great year. He's improved his time by almost 20 seconds."

Sevilla-Connelly is seeded No. 27 and competes Friday at 6:10 p.m.

Nate Hobbs, Peabody, Mass.

Hobbs is back in the NCAA Prelims. He also qualified in 2019 after winning the America East Championship as a freshman with a school-record jump of 24 feet, 9.75 inches. He broke a school mark that had stood since 1958.

One key in the Prelims will be coming out ready to go, Boulanger said, since the competitors are limited to three jumps total, unlike in some meets when they get more as they advance into another round.

"It's who's ready to go early," Boulanger said. "Nate has gotten much more consistent and is hitting more 24-foot jumps than before and I think that's an important factor. We know he can open at 24-6 or 24-8 because he did at America East."

Hobbs pushed the school record out to 24 feet, 10.5 inches in UNH's final home meet on April 24.

Hobbs is another of the all-around athletes in the contingent competing at the Prelims.

As part of the recruiting process, he wanted to have the opportunity to try out for the UNH basketball team if coach Bill Herrion agreed. Boulanger and Herrion both did agree and Hobbs made the team and was on it as a freshman.

Hobbs is seeded No. 23 and competes Wednesday at 3 p.m.

James Wilkes, Concord, N.H.

Wilkes had to play a bit of a waiting game before nailing down his spot in the NCAA Prelims.

He was on the bubble for qualifying when the season ended and Boulanger at first thought he might not make the cut. But as others who were just ahead of him on the list chose what events they were going to compete in or opted out of the 800 for whatever reason, he slipped in as the No. 46 qualifier.

"It's tremendous," Boulanger said. "Jamie thinks he could have run faster in the IC4As and he's excited."

Wilkes put himself in contention to qualify with a big run in the IC4As, his last-chance race before the selections.

There he turned in his career best time of time 1 minute, 49.63 seconds.

It was the next step in a breakthrough season that not only is sending Wilkes to the NCAAs for the first time in his four years at UNH, but has him looking to his running future.

He has been accepted into a PhD program in chemistry at Boston College, which will also earn him a masters degree along the way. He's likely to use his final year of eligibility to compete with the Eagles.

Wilkes, who also won the male Jim Urquhart Award as the top senior student athlete at UNH this year, runs in the first round of the 800 on Wednesday at 7:50 p.m. The quarterfinals are Friday at 7:35 p.m.

NCAA LINKS:

CHAMPIONSHIP CENTRAL
EAST PRELIM PERFORMANCE LIST
EAST PRELIM SCHEDULE
EAST PRELIM RESULTS
WEDNESDAY VIDEO STREAM
THURSDAY VIDEO STREAM
FRIDAY VIDEO STREAM
SATURDAY VIDEO STREAM
HEAT SHEET (MEN)
HEAT SHEET (WOMEN)

Allen Lessels
@UNHInsider
Allen.Lessels@unh.edu

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Alyssa Colbert

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