Barrett, Cordova, Landrith, Welling highlight busy sports week
Tucson’s Big Four of the week in sports:
1. Brigetta Barrett. The six-time NCAA high-jump champion at Arizona, the 2012 London Olympics silver medalist, has apparently left the sport and won’t enter the U.S. Olympic Trials in July.
Her longtime coach, ex-Arizona jumps coach Sheldon Blockburger, now at USC, told me he hasn’t seen Barrett at the track in more than 10 weeks. UA head coach Fred Harvey said “it’s my understanding she has officially retired.”
At 25, Barrett is pursing a career in theater and singing, auditioning for various acting and commercial roles in Los Angeles. She was well-known as a singer in her UA days, doing the national anthem at Diamondbacks games, McKale Center and at the Fiesta Bowl. Barrett was ranked No. 1 in the world as recently as 2013, but had hip surgery last summer and did not compete.
People are also reading…
Whatever her career choices, it’s probably too late now for her to properly train and contend for a spot on the USA Olympic team in Rio.
2. Cooper Cordova. The Mountain View High School senior, playing in the Ping Junior Interclub Championships last weekend at Randolph North, got a hole-in-one at the par-3, 135-yard No. 6 hole. A few minutes later, at the par-5, 496-yard No. 9 hole, he hit his second shot about 205 yards into the hole. Double eagle.
Those who witnessed the hole-in-one and double eagle — Robert Moreno, Tyler Werbylo and Dylan Telford — had never seen anything like it. And apparently, few have. It is only the 11th known combination of hole-in-one and double-eagle in the same round in golf history, according to the worldwide registry of the Double Eagle Club.
Cordova finished the round with a 3-over-par 75.
3. Robin Landrith. On Senior Day at Baylor’s Getterman Stadium, the Flowing Wells High grad caught a no-hitter for seven innings, but the softball game against Kansas remained tied, 0-0.
In the bottom of the seventh, Landrith hit a walk-off, two-run home run to win it, in front of her father, David Landrith, a former UA catcher and longtime baseball coach at Flowing Wells.
“I’ve got to say it’s a little bit priceless,” Robin told reporters.
Robin Landrith comes from a historic line of catchers. Her grandfather, Hobie Landrith, played for seven MLB teams, and was the New York Mets’ first-ever pick in the expansion draft. Her father was part of Arizona’s 1980 NCAA championship team.
Robin is graduating this month with a near-perfect GPA in theology and has accepted a scholarship to Yale graduate school to pursue her master’s degree in art and religion.
4. Tara Erdmann Welling. The former state champion distance runner from Flowing Wells completed part II of USA Track and Field’s Triple Crown on Saturday in Columbus, Ohio.
Welling won the USA Half-Marathon championship, in a time of 1 hour 10 minutes 25 seconds, more than 40 seconds in front of the field. Last month, she won the USA 15K championship in Florida. The final leg of the distance-running Triple Crown is October’s USA 10K in Boston.
Welling, who now lives in Portland, Oregon, left Nike’s high-profile Oregon Project about two years ago, got married, and appeared to have completed a terrific career in which she was a six-time All-American at Loyola Marymount. Now, however, she has a strong opportunity to compete for the U.S. Olympic team in the 10,000.
