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Coro: Marshall makes GCU history
2/28/2018 5:20:00 PM | Track and Field, Paul Coro
Pole vaulter to be Lopes' 1st Division I NCAAs competitor
Grand Canyon senior pole vaulter Scott Marshall will make history for the Lopes when he is GCU's first student-athlete to compete in Division I NCAA Championships.
There also was history in the path that took him to being named Wednesday to the March 9-10 NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships field.
It began with a Phoenix middle-schooler being introduced to the sport with his hands duct-taped to the pole that he released too readily. Nearly 10 years later, Marshall set a GCU pole vault record Saturday at the WAC Indoor Track and Field Championships and ran to hug GCU associate head coach Todd Lehman, who held that 2008 youth camp that sparked Marshall's fire.
Marshall tied for the ninth-best pole vault in the nation when he cleared 5.51 meters (18 feet, 1 inch) but he watches video of it and sees how he can do more toward his goal of 5.7 meters, a qualifying height for Olympics or World Championships.
This was always the expectation for Marshall, who ranked in the top five nationally in high school and competed for a year at Wake Forest before coming to GCU in 2014 to be with Lehman and return to his hometown.
The confidence that he would be an elite pole vaulter might be why Marshall remained so calm Saturday with electronic dance music and record visions in his head at the WAC Championships.
"Even through my warmup, I was happy," Marshall said. "I was having a great time. Everyone else was stressing out because it's the conference meet. But I was just in my zone, having fun, listening to music. I got on the runway and everything felt fantastic. Once the competition started, I was nervous but I made the first bar by two feet. I thought, 'All right, this is going to be a good day.' "
It was a great day.
Needing to be top 16 in the nation to advance to the NCAA Championships, Marshall was positioned precariously at No. 13 until his record performance.
"It was really special," Lehman said. "We go through a lot. Blood, sweat and tears is literal. When he gave me the hug, my comment was 'Congratulations, now let's keep it together and get back to work.' "
Marshall and Lehman first met when Marshall's big brother, Craig, "dragged" him to a pole vault summer camp in Flagstaff. The little brother's speed helped him overcome his initial awkwardness with the new sport.
"Then, I just fell in love with it," Marshall said.
Marshall was in the right spot at Phoenix's Desert Vista High School, where pole vault coach Jeff Guy is recognized as one of the best in the nation. Marshall progressed rapidly to national competition, plateaued as a junior and re-committed himself as a senior to reach No. 4 in the nation.
Wake Forest was not the right fit for Marshall and he made his first transfer inquiry to Lehman and GCU, which became a Division I program after Marshall graduated from high school in 2013. It proved even more fortuitous when GCU added a program for engineering, his intended major.
"He's bought in to everything we ever had him do or asked him to do," Lehman said. "The vault is tough. It's timing. It's luck. It's hard on your body. He's had to endure a lot of that and been patient through having the event beat him up. He's at a point where it's all starting to pay off.
"He has never wavered on his dedication. He has high, lofty goals, beyond what we've done."
Marshall's relationship with Lehman as a friend and advisor evolved into more, just as his athletic performance did at GCU.
Marshall progressed in the pole vault with more attention to technique, weight training, physical therapy and nutrition. His personal record might have been delayed a year by the broken toe he suffered in October 2016, sidelining him for eight weeks. He still set a personal record of 17-10 last season, but the extra training time before this season has paid off.
His senior year still had a setback when he prefaced it by suffering a concussion and collapsed lung when he sailed over the pit while training at Desert Vista last summer.
"It happens," Marshall said. "It's the sport."
Marshall's national stature is validating for Lopes track and field head coach Tom Flood's program and its goals to gain national status. The men's and women's teams won their third consecutive WAC indoor titles Saturday, but Marshall's achievement lays a base for larger aspirations.
"I'm kind of happy it's me," Marshall said of being GCU's first NCAA Championships competitor next week at Texas A&M. "I'm competitive so I'd like it to be me over someone else. I hope I do the school well.
"The added competition is really going to help. Conference was just me at the end. With a lot of big guys, it'll help keep the adrenaline and get me jumping higher."
Follow Paul Coro on Twitter: @paulcoro.
There also was history in the path that took him to being named Wednesday to the March 9-10 NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships field.
It began with a Phoenix middle-schooler being introduced to the sport with his hands duct-taped to the pole that he released too readily. Nearly 10 years later, Marshall set a GCU pole vault record Saturday at the WAC Indoor Track and Field Championships and ran to hug GCU associate head coach Todd Lehman, who held that 2008 youth camp that sparked Marshall's fire.
Marshall tied for the ninth-best pole vault in the nation when he cleared 5.51 meters (18 feet, 1 inch) but he watches video of it and sees how he can do more toward his goal of 5.7 meters, a qualifying height for Olympics or World Championships.
This was always the expectation for Marshall, who ranked in the top five nationally in high school and competed for a year at Wake Forest before coming to GCU in 2014 to be with Lehman and return to his hometown.
The confidence that he would be an elite pole vaulter might be why Marshall remained so calm Saturday with electronic dance music and record visions in his head at the WAC Championships.
"Even through my warmup, I was happy," Marshall said. "I was having a great time. Everyone else was stressing out because it's the conference meet. But I was just in my zone, having fun, listening to music. I got on the runway and everything felt fantastic. Once the competition started, I was nervous but I made the first bar by two feet. I thought, 'All right, this is going to be a good day.' "
It was a great day.
Needing to be top 16 in the nation to advance to the NCAA Championships, Marshall was positioned precariously at No. 13 until his record performance.
"It was really special," Lehman said. "We go through a lot. Blood, sweat and tears is literal. When he gave me the hug, my comment was 'Congratulations, now let's keep it together and get back to work.' "
Marshall and Lehman first met when Marshall's big brother, Craig, "dragged" him to a pole vault summer camp in Flagstaff. The little brother's speed helped him overcome his initial awkwardness with the new sport.
"Then, I just fell in love with it," Marshall said.
Marshall was in the right spot at Phoenix's Desert Vista High School, where pole vault coach Jeff Guy is recognized as one of the best in the nation. Marshall progressed rapidly to national competition, plateaued as a junior and re-committed himself as a senior to reach No. 4 in the nation.
Wake Forest was not the right fit for Marshall and he made his first transfer inquiry to Lehman and GCU, which became a Division I program after Marshall graduated from high school in 2013. It proved even more fortuitous when GCU added a program for engineering, his intended major.
"He's bought in to everything we ever had him do or asked him to do," Lehman said. "The vault is tough. It's timing. It's luck. It's hard on your body. He's had to endure a lot of that and been patient through having the event beat him up. He's at a point where it's all starting to pay off.
"He has never wavered on his dedication. He has high, lofty goals, beyond what we've done."
Marshall's relationship with Lehman as a friend and advisor evolved into more, just as his athletic performance did at GCU.
Marshall progressed in the pole vault with more attention to technique, weight training, physical therapy and nutrition. His personal record might have been delayed a year by the broken toe he suffered in October 2016, sidelining him for eight weeks. He still set a personal record of 17-10 last season, but the extra training time before this season has paid off.
His senior year still had a setback when he prefaced it by suffering a concussion and collapsed lung when he sailed over the pit while training at Desert Vista last summer.
"It happens," Marshall said. "It's the sport."
Marshall's national stature is validating for Lopes track and field head coach Tom Flood's program and its goals to gain national status. The men's and women's teams won their third consecutive WAC indoor titles Saturday, but Marshall's achievement lays a base for larger aspirations.
"I'm kind of happy it's me," Marshall said of being GCU's first NCAA Championships competitor next week at Texas A&M. "I'm competitive so I'd like it to be me over someone else. I hope I do the school well.
"The added competition is really going to help. Conference was just me at the end. With a lot of big guys, it'll help keep the adrenaline and get me jumping higher."
Follow Paul Coro on Twitter: @paulcoro.
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/ Track and Field
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