GREENSBORO-Despite some strong showings by several of its distance and middle distance runners, the men's track team had only four points to show for its efforts at the Atlantic Coast Championships going into the 800 meter finals on Saturday afternoon.
But in less than two minutes, the Blue Devils added nine more points, as senior Doug Kling ran to a third-place finish and senior Miles Hall came in sixth. To finish third, Kling outdueled defending ACC champion Milton Campbell of North Carolina. Both runners who beat Kling qualified for the NCAA meet.
"I'm very, very proud of Doug," assistant coach Norm Ogilvie said. "The ACC is an extremely tough conference in the 800. This is the highlight of [Kling's] Duke career. It was a good competitive race by Doug."
Kling ran 1:55.22 in the final, and Hall ran 1:56.44. Both had faster times in their preliminary races on Friday, as Kling qualified for the finals with a 1:54.83 run, and Hall ran 1:55.24. For both Kling and Hall, Friday was the first time that they had run the 800 meters this season.
"I was a little worried about not having raced before this meet," Kling said. "But I came out and felt pretty good in the prelims, so I was pretty confident going into the final. There were some good people in there, but I feel like I raced pretty well and stuck in there."
Later on Saturday, the Blue Devils added three more points with their sixth-place finish in the mile relay, the meet's final event. Duke finished ninth in the conference with 16 points at the Greensboro Coliseum Special Events Center.
Freshman Jesse Allen led off the mile relay with a leg of 50.8 seconds, and he was followed by strong showings by junior Jason Manse (51.1 seconds) and Kling (52.1). But it was sophomore Mark Simmons who secured Duke's victory over the relay squad from Virginia. The Cavaliers' anchor runner attempted to pass on the second lane, which has slightly longer and steeper curves than the inside lane. Simmons kept up his pace, though, forcing his opponent to stay on the outside, and allowing Duke to finish ahead of Virginia.
"That was the best racing we've ever seen Mark do," Ogilvie said. "It was a great way to end the meet for us."
Although he did not score any points, junior Danny Schuman also came through on Friday with one of Duke's biggest-and most surprising-results of the weekend. Schuman broke his indoor personal record in the mile by over eight seconds, finishing his preliminary race in 4:17.58. This qualified Schuman for Saturday's final, where he placed ninth in 4:26.36 after running competitively for the first 800 meters.
"He just believed in himself and never folded [on Friday]," Ogilvie said. "Often when you see an athlete break a personal record by that big a chunk, it's hard to come back the next day and do it again."
Duke's first point of the meet came in the 5,000 meters on Friday evening. Freshman Tom Becker placed eighth in the event in 15:01.71. Junior Matt Haywood also had a strong showing in that race, finishing ninth in 15:10.77. Becker and Haywood actually finished seventh and eighth, respectively, in the fast heat of the 5,000, but a runner from the slow heat had a better time and bumped Duke's runners down a spot.
The Blue Devil distance medley relay squad, which finished second in the ACC meet last year, could not repeat its performance of 1995. The team earned three points with its sixth-place showing.
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