Neil Qualifies for Nationals, Wildcats Break Records at 2026 Heart Indoor Championships
MARYVILLE, Mo. - Highlighted by two school records and a national qualifier, the Baker men's and women's track and field teams competed at the 2026 Heart Indoor Track & Field Championships this past weekend in Maryville, Mo.
Overall, the Wildcats posted 11 top-eight finishes with five of them coming on relay events, including the men's 4x800-meter relay team that placed second en route to breaking the program's indoor mark.
The 4x800m relay consisting of Jacob McGlasson, Cutter Meade, Luke Persson and Micah Sanders clocked a time of 7:53.61 to earn runner-up honors in the race. Their time was a second faster than the 2020 BU men's team (Roesner-Ruiz-Packard-Walker), who set the program's previous mark at the conference meet six years ago.
Kemaro Neil became Baker's first national qualifier of the indoor slate after clearing the NAIA 'B' standard in the 600m on Friday, just missing the podium with a fourth-place finish in the event.
Neil's time of 1:20.16 not only punched his first postseason ticket, but it also broke the school record that was previously held by Jordan Weimer from 2021. The sophomore from Kingston, Jamaica, had already set one program record earlier this year, breaking the Wildcats' 600-yard mark (1:12.09) at the Bearcat Invite.
It was a little more bittersweet for Neil's 600-meter teammate and fellow Jamaican Rodree Robinson, who followed right behind him in fifth, but missed out on the NAIA qualifying by two milliseconds (1:20.55).
Robinson scratched across a couple more points for BU in the 800m, serving as the front end of a back-to-back Wildcats finish in seventh and eighth. Robinson ran a 1:57.63 to add a seventh-place finish to his conference outing, while Meade went 1:58.34 and took eighth to finish off a solid indoor campaign for the junior from Paola, Kan.
In her first Heart championship appearance, freshman Haylei Potter came in fourth in the women's pole vault after setting her new personal-best clearance at 3.10 meters. Potter, who is in her first year at BU out of Burlington, Kan., also tallied her fastest 400m time with a 1:00.26 on Saturday.
Haley Carter came away with a couple of top-eight finishes after placing eighth, individually, in the 5K on a time of 19:09.86 and as part of the BU women's 4000m distance medley team (Carter, Ellie Barnard, Rylee Lansdown, Aubrey Phillips) that finished in seventh.
The 61st Annual NAIA Indoor Track & Field National Championships will take place on March 5-7 at the Alachua County Sports & Events Center at Celebration Pointe in Gainesville, Fla.
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