JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Kicking off the NCAA East Preliminary Round Thursday in Jacksonville, Fla., one Blue Devil punched his ticket to the upcoming NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships in Eugene, Ore., and three others qualified for this weekend's quarterfinals to highlight a successful showing for the Duke program.

Heading into the men's 10,000 seeded second and with the fourth-fastest time among all NCAA Division I runners this spring, graduate student Shaun Thompson secured the first trip of his career to the NCAA Outdoor Championships by placing eighth with a time of 30:05.28. Thompson accomplished just what he needed to in an extremely tight race, as the top-12 competitors all finished within three seconds of each other. For Thompson, the ticket to Eugene validates a promise he made to himself years ago.

“It was two years ago today, more or less , that I made a pact with myself,” Thompson said. “I had three seasons left, one for cross [country], indoor and outdoor [track & field], and I hadn't made it to nationals in any of them individually yet. I said, 'before I leave Duke, I'm going to make nationals in all three of them.' I made it in indoors last year, cross this past year and I just made outdoors. I got my goal.”

In addition to Thompson's performance, three Blue Devil women kept their hopes of making it to Eugene alive by qualifying for the quarterfinals of their respective races. Starting in the women's 1,500, senior Madison Granger clocked a 4:20.86, the 16^th-best prelim time, to finish fifth in her heat and snag an automatic-qualifying spot for Saturday's race. Fellow senior Anima Banks matched Granger's efforts by securing an automatic bid of her own in the women's 800, placing third in her heat and sixth overall with a 2:05.07. Banks will race in the women's 800 quarterfinals Friday evening.

Sophomore sprinter Maddy Price joined the pair by qualifying for Friday's quarterfinals in the women's 400. Running in heat five, Price registered a personal-best time of 52.88, the second-fastest time in Duke history, to finish fourth overall. That performance held up as the 15^th-fastest prelim time to secure an at-large bid for the quarterfinals. Price was joined by junior Madeline Kopp in the 400, who finished 34^th overall with a 53.85 showing. Granger, Banks and Price will need to place among the top 12 in their respective quarterfinals to advance to the NCAA Outdoor Championships.

Redshirt senior Teddi Maslowski, who has already secured a trip to Eugene in the heptathlon, rounded out the Duke women's day on the track by placing 36^th in the women's 400-meter hurdles with a time of 59.99. Maslowski is scheduled to race again Friday in the 100-meter hurdles and Saturday in the women's 4x400 with Price, Kopp and freshman MacKenzie Kerr.

Joining Thompson on the men's side, redshirt junior Michal Filipczak finished 43^rd in the men's 800, clocking a 1:51.72, while junior Alec Kunzweiler took 45^th in the men's 1,500 with a time of 3:54.07.

Competing as Duke's lone field event representative Thursday, junior Christine Streisel, who was seeded 42^nd in the women's javelin, finished 26^th overall in the event with a throw of 142-2 (43.34m).

The Blue Devils will return to Hodges Stadium Friday for the second day of the NCAA East Preliminary Round, beginning at noon with field events and 5 p.m. with running events.

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