Did the transfer portal save the sprinting career of Jacious Sears?
Every year in the NCAA a new national champion is crowned. They do it in every single event, indoors and outdoors, and at least 8 of them in each one get to call themselves All Americans. But the thing about track is that nobody really remembers whoever came in second place. Sha’carri Richardson dominated the 100 meter dash as a freshman to win the NCAA title back in 2019. Yet most fans can’t remember who finished second to her in that race? For the record it was Kayla White who joined her in 2023 on team USA, but formerly of North Carolina A&T.
Then there are the truly dominant sprinters. Women who stuck around long enough for people to get bored of seeing them win. That was Julien Alfred in 2023, who swept the sprints at the indoor and outdoor championships. But there was one woman who showed up to college right after Sha’Carri’s championship run. And she has stuck around all the way until the end of the Julien Alfred era. And now it is her turn to take over the throne as queen of the sprints.
Jacious Sears is that woman and the collegiate leader now in the 60 and 200 meter dashes. She is leading both events by a pretty wide margin. So the real question is not “can Jacious Sears dominate the sprints this season?” But rather “will she do it?” At this point the conversation is shapping up to be “are you going with Jacious Sears, or are you taking the field?”
How good was Jacious Sears before she transferred?
Jacious Sears is not an underdog story. She’s actually far from it. She was a track and field phenom, who was always supposed to become one of America’s next great sprinters. But it just took her a little bit longer than we might have expected to get there. At the high school level Jacious Sears would have rated as a 4 star recruit on SCArecruiting.com by the end of her sophomore year. But by the time she finished high school she was legitimately 5 star level. As a senior she won the state championship in the 100 meter dash in Florida, which is a state where that actually matters in recruiting. So she proved that she was good enough to impress the coaches at the University of Miami and chose them to continue her career.
She ran fast for them out the gate finishing second indoors in the ACC 60 meter dash as a freshman. She would later win 2 more conference medals in the ACC through her third season there. She even won the indoor 60 meter dash title in 2022. But nobody really paid attention because throughout all her success Jacious never made it to an NCAA championship meet.
When you are a five star recruit, you are supposed to win big at the NCAA level. If you don’t at the very least make the championship meet, then anything less is a huge disappointment. That is perhaps why she looked to make a change, transferring to the University of Tennessee, with sprint coach Duane Ross. For the record, he is the same man who coached Kayla White to finish right behind Sha’Carri Richardson all the way back in 2019.
How good is Jacious Sears after transferring?
In a Tennessee uniform last year, Jacious finally took the leap forward she was always hoping for. She ran huge PRS in all her events on the way to winning the SEC indoors and outdoors in the 60 and 100 meter dashes. Those performances landed her not only in the NCAA championship meet, but in the finals for all of her events. She finished 3rd overall in the 60 indoors and third once again in the 100 meter dash outdoors. She even went fourth outdoors in the 200 meter dash. The only time she didn’t make the NCAA final was indoors in the 200 meter dash, but she only missed it by less than a tenth of a second. Up until then she had never qualified for an NCAA championship meet at all, until she got to Tennessee.
When you consider that Julien Alfred is now gone from college to run at the pro level, it makes sense that Jacious Sears now sits atop the leaderboards. She underachieved for the most part through her entire Miami career by any standard you would give a legitimate 5 star recruit. And since she has gotten to Tennessee, has validated that ranking by beating the entire SEC indoors and outdoors. She spent her entire career trying to get into a national championship final, and now that she has done it, the only thing left to do is to get back to it one more time, and win it all.
The Bottom Line
It is unclear whether or not Jacious Sears will be the next NCAA champion in the sprints. But what is clear is that the competition right now is struggling to keep up with her. If she does pull this off, it won’t only be the biggest accomplishment of her career. It will also be validation of the promise she showed all the way back in high school. Heavy is the head that wears the crown. And only a few sprinters ever get a chance to be the queen of the sprints. Jacious Sears has not only proven she’s ready for it, but she honestly was always supposed to do it. We just weren’t paying attention because she wasn’t in the front of the race enough yet, for us to pay attention.
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